boredomresearch, is a collaboration between British artists Vicky Isley and Paul Smith, established in 1999. Their artwork is inspired by natural environments, exploring the diversity that exists in nature and more recently the fragility of these ecosystems. They use digital 3D game, animation and film tools to create poetic and cinematic expressions. Presenting biological insights and creative speculations that encourage us to understand ourselves and our environment from a different perspective. Creating artworks “that peel back the visible so that audiences can see the invisible” which are “highly imaginative” and “works of great depth” (Pamela Winfrey, Scientific Research Curator, Biodesign Institute Arizona 2024). Fascinated by human interaction with landscape, their artwork brings together innovative science, creative use of digital technology and a deep understanding of the complex interplay between human culture and natural systems.
Boredomresearch has been collaborating with world leading science institutions since 2014, producing projects that explore: the beauty and diversity of natural systems, critically endangered and extinct species, environmental conservation and human and animal diseases. Their art and science collaborative project AfterGlow won the moving image 2016 Lumen Prize Award which celebrates the very best global art created with technology. In 2021, they were artists-in-residence at the UNESCO Cuilcagh Lakelands Geopark in Ireland where they engaged with local scientists, folklorists and farmers to create their award winning film The Cavanoids Dance (2022).
“Their exceptional contemporary art practices will bring project partners and participants on an impactful and exhilarating journey of discovery that will leave a lasting impression” (Dr Suzy O’Hara, Project Engagement Manager/Curator, Human Cell Atlas, Sanger Institute 2024).
They are currently working on a short film, Gentle as Moss on Stone (2025), for Natural Resources Wales – Natur am Byth! project, which is aiming to save vulnerable species from extinction. As part of this project boredomresearch has been in residence in Powys, Wales (2024) researching rare mosses and running creative microscopy, film and narrative moss workshops with neurodiverse young people.
The artworks of boredomresearch are in collections around the world including the British Council, Southampton City Art Gallery and Borusan Contemporary Art Collection, Istanbul. The artists have shown their work worldwide including the following venues: ASU Art Museum, Arizona; ArtScience Museum, Singapore; Gwacheon National Science Museum, Seoul ; House of Electronic Arts, Basel; DAM Gallery, Berlin; Laboral, Gijon and Today Art Museum, Beijing.
Isley and Smith were Research Lecturers at the National Centre for Computer Animation, Bournemouth University (2005-20). In 2015 they initiated BLAST (Bournemouth Lab of Art, Science & Technology) which celebrates, reinforces and nurtures world leading arts, science and technological interactions.
selected cv
solo exhibitions & screenings 2005-22
The Cavanoids Dance, Town Hall Gallery, Cavan Ireland (2022);
Paisley Pearls, Aberdeen Music Hall, Scotland (2022);
In Search of Chemozoa, Aspex Gallery, Portsmouth (2021);
Restless Balance, ASU Art Museum, Arizona (2020-21);
Paisley Pearls, Paisley Museum, Glasglow (2016-17);
Fragments, DAM Gallery, Berlin (2013);
By This Time Next Year, Georges House Gallery, Folkestone (2011);
Brilliant Cloud, DAM Gallery, Cologne (2011);
Brilliant Cloud, Millais Off-site Project Space, Southampton (2010);
Chasing Stillness, DAM Gallery, Berlin (2009);
Tumbling Dream Chambers, DAM Gallery, Berlin (2007);
Theatre of Restless Automata, Peterborough Digital Arts (March 2006); New Greenham Arts, Newbury (2005); HTTP, Islington, London (2005) and Aspex Gallery, Portsmouth (2005).
selected group exhibitions 2021-24
Braziers International Film Festival, Ipsden, Oxfordshire (2024);
Resonate Exhibition, Treadgolds Community Garden, Portsmouth (2023);
Southampton Film Week, Best Art Film Award for ‘The Cavanoids Dance’ (2023);
VISIONS COME TRUE, Chi K11 Art Museum, Shanghai (2023);
River Residencies Exhibition, Ormston House, Limerick Ireland (17 February – 8 April 2023);
Southampton Film Week, Screening and awards ceremony (12 November 2022);
Paisley: A Princely Pattern, Museum for Islamic Art, Jerusalem (2022-23);
The C Word, 850 Biomedical Building Art & Science Exhibition, Phoenix Arizona (2022);
RAW Science Film Festival, Online (2022);
SCINEMA, International Science Film Festival, Online (2022);
Sigma Xi STEM Art and Film Festival, Online (2021).
2016-20
Mar Menor Reset, Center del Carme Cultura Contemporània, València (2020-21);
Gallery 80, Southampton City Art Gallery 80th Year Exhibition, Southampton (2019);
Event 2, Royal College of Art, London (2019);
Shenzhen New Media Arts Festival, Cultural Complex of Pingshan New District, Shenzhen (2019);
Digital Intersections, Cartavetrata Exhibition, Church of San Martino di Lupari, Italy (2018);
Nature as Data, Jing’an Sculpture Park Art Center, Shanghai (2018);
Seeing Systems ArtScience Museum, Singapore (2018);
CAS50: Fifty Years of The Computer Art Society Lightbox Gallery, Leicester (2018);
The Women of Wray Castle: Convention and Control Wray Castle, Cumbria (2018);
Both Sides Now 4 – UK Tour Phoenix, Leicester (29 March 2018); Fabrica, Brighton (27 March 2018); SOAS, University of London (9 March 2018) and HOME, Manchester (2 December 2017);
SUBMERGED SciArt Center Online Exhibition (9 Nov 2017 – ongoing);
Artience Daejeon 17 Silent Signal, British Council Exhibition, Daejeon Artist House, Daejeon, South Korea (15-24 September 2017);
Balance Unbalance Plymouth UK (21 – 23 August 2017);
Our Friends Electric QUAD Gallery Derby (1 July – 10 Sept 2017);
Future Emerging Art & Technology (FEAT) Exhibition, LifeSpace Dundee and BOZAR, Brussels (14-30 Sept 2017);
ISEA 2017 Manizales, Colombia (2017);
3rd Culture Film Festival, Loft22 in Lan Kwai Fong, Hong Kong (2017);
Lumen Prize Exhibition, tour in 2017 includes: Winter Lights Festival, Canary Wharf London; FQ Projects Shanghai and Creative Tech Week, NYC (2017); tour in 2016 includes: Berlin Electronic Visualisation of the Arts Conference, State Museum of Berlin (2016); Caerphilly Castle, Wales (2016) and Lumen Winners Gala, Hackney House, London (2016).
Data Aesthetics Exhibition, Openbare Bibliotheek Amsterdam in conjunction with ACM Multimedia conference and Waag Society (2016);
Festival of Endless Gratitude, Copenhagen (2016);
Alt-w Exhibition, Edinburgh Art Festival (2016);
Science of the Unseen, SIGGRAPH 2016 Online Exhibition – Anaheim, California (2016);
Glasgow Science Festival, Scotland (2016);
Digitra Exhibition, Treviso ricerca arte, Treviso Italy (2016);
VIS Vienna Independent Shorts Festival, Austria (2016);
Balance Unbalance Exhibition, Colombia (2016);
Oberhausen International Short Film Festival, Germany (2016);
Silent Signal Animate Projects Exhibition supported by the Wellcome Trust touring to QUAD, Derby; Vivid Projects, Birmingham; Wellcome Genome Campus, Hinxton; Wellcome Collection, London; LifeSpace, Dundee and Phoenix, Leicester in the UK (2016).
Moving Image NY, Waterfront New York Tunnel, New York (2016);
International Image Festival, Cultural and Convention Center Theater, Manizales Colombia (2016).
2010-15
Transitio_MX, Festival of Electronic & Video Art, National Arts Centre, Mexico City (2015);
ISEA International Symposium of Electronic Art, Vancouver Canada (2015);
BIOART Exhibition, Gwacheon National Science Museum, Seoul Korea (2015);
ACM Creativity and Cognition Exhibition, the Glasgow School of Art (2015);
Transmission Symposium, Bournemouth University (2015);
A EYE: An exhibition of art and nature inspired computation, AISB (The Society for the Study of Artificial Intelligence and the Simulation of Behaviour) 50th Convention, Goldsmith University London (2014);
Automatic Art, GV Art Gallery, London (2014);
Intuition and Ingenuity: An Art Exhibition in Celebration of the Life of Alan Turing, Bletchley Park (2013).
Soft Control:Art, Science and the Technological Unconscious, Kiblix, Maribor, Solvenia (2012);
Gateways, House of Electronic Arts, Basel Switzerland (2012);
Intuition and Ingenuity: An Art Exhibition in Celebration of the Life of Alan Turing, touring in 2012 to Phoenix Square, Leicester; Robert Gordon University Library Gallery, Aberdeen; AISB/IACAP World Congress 2012, Birmingham; V&A Digital Design Weekend, London; Lovebytes Festival, Sheffield; Lighthouse, Brighton and Kinetica Art Fair, London.
Uncontainable:Broken Stillness, ISEA, Istanbul (2011);
Gateways, KUMU Art Museum, Tallinn Estonia (2011);
Current, Harris Museum & Art Gallery, Preston (2011);
Broken Stillness, Salisbury Art Centre, Salisbury (2011);
Electrohype Biennial 2010, Ystad Art Museum, Ystad Sweden (2010-11);
Urban Topos/Edge City, Today Art Museum, Beijing (2010);
File Prix Luz, Sao Paulo, Brazil (2010);
NETinSPACE, MAXXI, Museo nazionale delle arti del XXI secolo, Rome (2010);
El Proceso como Paradigma, Laboral, Gijon (2010);
On the Edge of the World, John Hope Gateway Gallery, Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh (2010);
E-volve, DAM Gallery, Cologne (2010).
2006-09
British Science Festival, Guildhall, Guildford (2009);
Pattern Recognition, The City Gallery, Leceister (2009);
STRP Festival, Eindhoven, Netherlands (2009);
SALON Exhibition, The Study Gallery, Poole UK (2008);
SIGGRAPH08, Slow Art Gallery Exhibition, Los Angeles USA (2008);
Art.ficial Emotion 4.0: Emergence!, Instituto Itau Cultural, Sao Paulo Brazil (2008);
CAe2008, Computational Aesthetics Exhibition, Lisbon Portugal (2008);
Holy Fire:The Art of the Digital Age, iMAL Center for Digital Cultures and Technology, Brussels, Belgium (2008);
Digital Media Intervention, Headquarters former Valencia University, Spain (2008);
Follyplay, Event Burnley Youth Theatre, Lancaster (2008);
NETworking, Haifa Museum of Art, Israel (2008);
Velocity, Digital Art Festival, Folly Lancaster (2007);
Digiville, Lighthouse, Brighton (2007);
CAe2007, Computational Aesthetics Conference & Exhibition Banff Centre of Arts, Alberta Canada (2007);
Digital Aesthetics 2, Harris Museum & Art Gallery, Preston (2007);
Enter Festival, Unknown Territories Cambridge (2007);
Web Biennial 2007, Web Based International Contemporary Art Exhibition (2007).
Natural Habitats, Netherlands Media Art Institute, Montevideo Amsterdam (2006);
TAGGED , Space Media Arts, London (2006);
SIGGRAPH06, Intersections Art Gallery Exhibition, Boston USA (2006);
Unnatural Selection, Shrewsbury Museum & Art Gallery, open exhibition (2006);
ACE 2006, Leonardo exhibition, Hollywood LA (2006).
2002-05
SIGGRAPH05, Los Angeles International New Media Festival (2005);
New Forest Pavilion, Artsway Group Exhibition, Venice (2005);
Hands Free Series, Dorchester Arts Centre (2005);
Dots & Lines, BBC Online Sound Exhibition (2005);
Transmediale.05, international media arts festival, Berlin, Germany (2005);
FILE04 , International digital festival, Brazil (2004);
Data:Base , New Media Event, Dublin (2003);
Theory of Catastrophe, SCAN launch, Southampton (2003);
Aquanox, All Change, Islington, London Canal project (2003);
WinterWonderland, Lighthouse, Poole (2002);
Electrohype Biennial 2002, Malmo, Sweden (2002);
Power to the People, Contemporary Art Forum, Kitchener Exhibition, Canada (2002);
Garage, Festival for art, Music and Film, Stralsund, Germany (2002);
SoundToys, Convergence exhibition, New Media Centre, ICA, London www.soundtoys.net (2002);
SoftForm, Propeller Gallery, Toronto, Canada, www.hiveprojects.com/softform (2002);
Matter & Memory, Montreal, Canada www.mobilegaze.com/m+m (2002);
Possible not Probable, G39, Cardiff (2002);
minus20, Gasworks Gallery, London (2002).