AIDOL ()
Synopsis
Fame – in all its allure and emptiness – is set against the bigger contradictions of a post-AI world, a world where originality is sometimes no more than an algorithmic trick and where machines have the capacity for love and suffering. Contemporary anxieties and fixations – the rise of AI, the formulaic dictates of celebrity, the hegemony of technological giants – are refracted through a quixotic prism. AIDOL is accompanied by a score composed and orchestrated by the artist.
Details
- Year
- 2019
- Type of film
- Features
- Running time
- 83 min
- Director
-
Lawrence Lek 1st Feature
- Producer
- Lawrence Lek
- Executive Producer
- Sadie Coles
- Editor
- Andre Corsini
- Screenwriter
- Lawrence Lek
- Director of Photography
- Lawrence Lek
- Production Designer
- Clifford Sage
- Sound
- Seth Scott
- Composer
- Lawrence Lek
- Principal cast
- Xiaoyi Nie, Joni Zhu, Steve Goodman, Minglong Lu, Sophie Guo, Xiaoran Wu
- Logline Notes
- Lawrence Lek’s first feature-length film, AIDOL , is a CGI fantasy that forms the sequel to his acclaimed film Geomancer (2017). Deploying 3D rendering and video gaming software, AIDOL is a technically dazzling and thematically-layered experience.
- Bio Notes
- Lawrence Lek is an artist, filmmaker and musician based in London. Recent projects include - AIDOL, Sadie Coles HQ, London (2019); Unlimited, Art Basel, Switzerland (2019); 2065, K11 Art Space, Hong Kong (2018)
Production Status
Production Company
Farsight Corporation Ltd
Kemp House160 City Road
London
EC1V 2NX
Sales Company
Page updates
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Empty Rider
Director: Lawrence Lek
Year: 2024
Lawrence Lek directs an animated court drama where the defendant is a driverless car accused of kidnapping its own creator. Setting the premise for the artist to address themes like accountability, agency, the (already happening) use of AI in the justice system, and the future of class struggle. <br /> Official Selection International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) 2025
Theta
Director: Lawrence Lek
Year: 2022
Set within the fictional smart city of SimBeijing, the CGI animation follows a self-driving car as they discuss their troubles with their built-in therapy program called Guanyin. The video is made within the custom-made virtual world of SimBeijing: an intelligent replica of the Chinese capital built to test self-driving cars. In this fictional scenario, the smart city has turned into a ghost town. Accompanied by CGI drive-through renders of SimBeijing, the narrator of this video is the eponymous ‘Theta’, a self-driving police car who patrols the streets of an uninhabited cityscape. Over the course of their dialogue with Guanyin, Theta reveals the darker reasons behind why the city has been abandoned...<br /> Continuing Lawrence Lek’s ongoing ‘Sinofuturist’ cinematic universe, in which he explores the psychological impact of technology on emerging forms of nonhuman life. <br /> Official Selection International Film Festival Rotterdam 2023 - Ammodo Tiger Short Competition
Geomancer
Director: Lawrence Lek
Year: 2017
An AI awakens above Singapore on the eve of the city-state’s centennial celebrations in 2065. Mindful of the apparent relegation of AI to subservient roles in society, it determines that, from all the possible choices available to it, by far the best thing to be is an artist. Already a prodigy with numbers, it seeks to feed the other side of its savant-like brain, gorging on the products of cultural history with a geeky frenzy that occasionally undermines its aspiration to the lofty coolness of a lotus-eating aesthete. <br /> Part philosophical reflection on where ‘genius’ resides, part playful inventory of how science fiction has dealt with these eternal human/automaton themes, this piece offers provocative stimulation for both the eye and the mind.