Welcome to the Social Art Award 2025 – Online Gallery!
We are grateful for the many powerful contributions from artists across the globe. The selected works reflect the diversity of contemporary social art practices and address urgent issues such as climate and water crises, social and economic inequality, migration, conflict, discrimination, and the protection of human and more-than-human life.
Below you will find the submissions from the edition of 2024/2025 that passed the initial jury round. The Online Gallery offers public visibility to these works and supports dialogue around their themes; it does not replace the final jury decision.
Thank you to all artists for sharing your inspiring and committed work. We invite you to explore the gallery and engage with the perspectives shaping the Social Art Award 2025.
EMBODIMEND (video)
DANAI NIKOLAIDI KOTSAKI
The idea of a system that mimics natural intelligence through artificial means led me to create the artwork “Embodiment”. Aiming to highlight the symbiotic relationships between Nature, like algae, bacteria, plants, fish, and Technology, a functional aquaponic system is developed. This closed-loop system uses fish waste to nourish plants (lettuce and other greens), creating an ecosystem where both fish and plants thrive. The fish produce waste that provides nutrients for the plants, while the plants purify the water, which is then returned clean to the fish. Within this natural cycle, the ceramic sculptures I’ve created provide surfaces for bacteria to inhabit, playing a crucial role in the water filtration process. The installation, questions whether nature’s inherent intelligence—its capacity for evolution, balance and regeneration—can be considered as a form of “artificial intelligence” in itself.
The idea of a system that mimics natural intelligence through artificial means led me to create the artwork “Embodiment”. Aiming to highlight the symbiotic relationships between Nature, like algae, bacteria, plants, fish, and Technology, a functional aquaponic system is developed. This closed-loop system uses fish waste to nourish plants (lettuce and other greens), creating an ecosystem where both fish and plants thrive. The fish produce waste that provides nutrients for the plants, while the plants purify the water, which is then returned clean to the fish. Within this natural cycle, the ceramic sculptures I’ve created provide surfaces for bacteria to inhabit, playing a crucial role in the water filtration process. The installation, questions whether nature’s inherent intelligence—its capacity for evolution, balance and regeneration—can be considered as a form of “artificial intelligence” in itself.