This summer, the iconic Aspen Art Museum launches the AIR festival—an ambitious platform redefining how art fuses with technology, philosophy, and the natural world. Ongoing from July 29 to August 1, “Life As No One Knows It,” the festival’s stirring inaugural edition, unfolds as both a retreat and a public celebration. The momentous initiative develops upon Aspen’s storied history as a crucible for artistic and intellectual breakthroughs, echoing the spirit of the legendary Aspen International Design Conference where mavericks like Susan Sontag, Robert Rauschenberg, and John Cage once gathered.
At its core, AIR emphasizes artists as cultural navigators. Conceived as a decade-long program, it merges site-responsive artworks, interdisciplinary dialogues, and groundbreaking performances to chart new ways of seeing—and feeling—the future.
Art at the Edge of the Unknown
PERFORMANCE, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, “On Blue,” 2022. Image courtesy the artist.
The heart of AIR’s programming lies in its commitment to experiential artists that challenge perceptions. Matthew Barney headlines the event with an audacious new performance merging elements from his Redoubt and SECONDARY projects, confronting American mythologies and the aesthetics of violence. Elsewhere, Jota Mombaça offers a visceral outdoor piece at Hallam Lake Nature Preserve, merging sound, body, and landscape, and Mimi Park transforms the Aspen Center for Physics into a sensorial laboratory, using sculpture and installation to voyage through networks and ecosystems.
“The heart of AIR’s programming lies in its commitment to experiential artists that challenge perceptions,”
Cannupa Hanska Luger’s otherworldly chorus of ceramic whistles will reverberate across Aspen, acting as a sonic prayer between universes. The acclaimed duo of filmmaker Apichatpong Weerasethakul and musician Rafiq Bhatia, with the Aspen Music Festival and School’s ensemble, will present On Blue, a surreal fusion of memory, dreams, and the subconscious.
Keynotes and Cross-Disciplinary Conversations
BLUHM-KAUL KEYNOTE, Francis Kéré. Photo: Erik Petersen.
The festival’s Bluhm-Kaul Keynotes, unveiled in divine partnership with Serpentine’s Artistic Director Hans Ulrich Obrist, promise moments of profound reflection. This year’s keynote speakers include architect Francis Kéré, whose practice rejoices in community and connection, and artist and architect Maya Lin, whose work bridges memory and the natural environment. Adding to this illustrious lineup is filmmaker Werner Herzog, who brings his singular vision of “ecstatic truth” to the Aspen stage. His keynote, drawn from his forthcoming book The Future of Truth, explores how art and cinema can sustain a sense of awe and metaphysical inquiry in an era of digital illusion and AI-generated realities.
“Werner Herzog is one of the most singular voices in cinema and culture—utterly fearless, wildly imaginative, and deeply human,” said Nancy and Bob Magoon Artistic Director and CEO Nicola Lees. “His work doesn’t just challenge how we see the world; it dares us to feel more, to think more expansively, and to embrace the unknown. It’s an absolute honor to celebrate his vision as part of our inaugural festival this summer.”
“Werner Herzog is one of the most singular voices in cinema and culture—utterly fearless, wildly imaginative, and deeply human,”
Nicola Lees
Parallel dialogues deepen the festival’s intellectual terrain. Topics range from the evolving nature of consciousness with poet Zoë Hitzig and neuroscientist Anil Seth, to the reimagining of time and history in speculative fiction with novelist Álvaro Enrigue with artist Adrián Villar Rojas. Under starlit skies, astrobiologist Sara Imari Walker joins artist Sophia Al Maria to consider the possibility of life beyond Earth.
AIR Retreat: Shaping Tomorrow
DIALOGUE, P. Staff and Jamieson Webster
P. Staff, “Weed Killer,” 2017. Courtesy of the artist.
Before the public festival begins, AIR hosts a three-day private retreat from July 26 to 28. This gathering brings together thirty-five artists, scientists, scholars, and cultural leaders—among them Lily Hu, Tung-Hui Hu, Aria Dean, Martine Syms, Okwui Okpokwasili, and Paul Chan—to explore how artistic thinking can influence the design of new technologies and cultural frameworks. Insights from these conversations will be published through e-flux Journal, extending the festival’s reach into broader cultural discourse.
Registration is open at airaspen.org, inviting seekers to witness the dawn of a festival poised to reshape the contours of the creative horizon.
COMMISSION, Cannupa Hanska Luger, “Watȟéča,” 2023. Image courtesy of the artist and Garth Greenan Gallery, New York. Photo: Gabriel Fermin.
Installation view: AUDIENCE PLANT 2024. Photo: Michael Coles. Courtesy Aspen Art Museum.
