Independent Cultural Producer, Artist
Summary
Luisa Ji is a cultural producer and artist based in Canada. She is the Director of UKAI Projects, an arts not-for-profit and platform where independent artists share infrastructure, resources, and public presence to advance their practices collectively. Through UKAI and independent collaborations, she conceives and stewards multi-site, touring initiatives at the intersection of ecology, technology, and cultural systems — working across residencies, public programs, and research with partners in Canada, Taiwan, Iceland, South Korea, and beyond. Her background in architectural design and spatial research informs her site-responsive, systems-oriented cultural practice.
Initiatives currently available for co-productions and partnerships via UKAI Projects’ organizational platform:
Intelligent Terrain
Goblin Market
Cultural Technologies Lab
Upcoming public engagement/workshop:
Saturday, May 2, 2026 | details TBA
OCAD Onsite Gallery, Cultural Fermentation & Other Messy Practices of Illegibility, co-delivery with Benjamin Lappalainen
Projects
by year of initiation2025Cultural Technologies Lab — Co-Lead
Community of practice reclaiming culture as a dynamic force for resilience rather than as a passive reflection of existing power structures
available for institutional partnership
Wishing Well — Artist
Participatory soundscape and live sonification.
Materials: borrowed objects from local shops, reclaimed roof tiles from Hinschu City Railway Warehouse, contact mics, bio-sonification module
Sound design by Luisa Ji and Benjamin Lappalainen; production support from Husna Farooqui
available for public activation commission
Pop-up: General Village, Hsinchu, Taiwan
2024Goblin Market — Lead Producer
post-scarcity festival framework reappropriates ‘rituals of commerce’ for fostering generosity, collaboration, and transformation
available for co-production
Read More
HOLO Magazine x MUTEK Future Festivals
Touring: Toronto 2025, Montréal 2025, Hsinchu (Taiwan) 2025, Halifax 2026
Sediments — Artist
Environmental sonification and collected soundscapes derived from local ecosystems near Wakefield, QC
completed
Residency: DAÏMÔN / Radio-Hull
Performance: Place-des-artistes de Farrellton (performed with Hooria Rahimi at River Room, a spatial installation by Rahimi)
When Spiders Spin Dusk — Co-Producer, Program Facilitator
6 artists based in Canada and Korea jointly research and develop works on themes concerning the geological shifts, cultural perspectives on AI, and technology’s relationships to the more-than-human world.
International co-production with Junghyun Kim with funding from Canada Council for the Arts and Arts Council Korea
completed
Research and Creation: June–September 2024 with residency at Ferme Lanthorn
Exhibitions: Toronto 2024, Seoul 2025
Shipwreck — Co-Producer
Durational presentation format centring around the question of "how do we make a home among ruins?"
completed
Reykjavik Documentation
Touring: Reykjavik 2024, Montréal 2025
2023Poetics of Synthetic Language — Co-Producer, Contributor
Residency and an experimental archive of Artificial Intelligence, large language models, and algorithmic systems edited by Jerrold McGrath and Mida Fiore (Milan, Italy)
completed
Reconnections — Platform Designer
In collaboration with Toronto-based dance company Nova Dance, we have created a digital ritual for the practice of namaskaram and an artistic exchange network founded on friendship in honor of Nova Dance’s performance works developed via digital collaboration tools during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns.
completed
2022Intelligent Terrain — Lead Producer, Researcher, Curriculum Designer
The program centres on land-based knowledge, patterns of natural ecology, and digital landscapes to explore the implications of algorithmic systems, automation, machine sensing, and displacement, exile, and migration across digital and physical borders. Intelligent Terrain series is an exploration of art-based land regeneration and ecological storytelling.
available for co-production
Read More
Abridged online program Call of the Void: 2025–ongoing
Cohorts: 2022, 2024 Spring, 2024 Fall (Canada-Korea Co-production)
Restructuring Futures — Co-Producer, Researcher
An ad-hoc digital platform built on a local mesh network to facilitate asynchronous collaboration in partnership with the Laboratory for Artistic Intelligence, UKAI Projects, and Hypha Cooperative.
completed
BEINGverse — Program Designer, Facilitator
Arts mentorship program design and curation of Augmented Reality community showcase in collaboration with BEING Studio
completed
2021 and prior2021 | Digital and/as Public Space — Designer
Digital activation for The Bentway’s programming in collaboration with FromLater
Directions to Nowhere in Particular
2021 | Sound Print — Public Engagement Program Designer, Facilitator
Exhibition with Kanika Gupta, THEMUSEUM, Kitchener, ON
SONICA – A Sound Experience | THEMUSEUM, Kitchener-Waterloo
2020 - 2021 | BEING HOME — Designer
Online publication design for Being Studio, showcasing works of artists with developmental disabilities
2020 - 2021 | Music in the Barns: Digital Futures of Classical Music — Designer
Digital adaptations and futures scenario development for classical music education
2020 - 2021 | UKAI Projects: New Not Normal — Designer
New Not Normal, a digital map, a series of digital residencies and artist-led mutual aid programs as a response to the post-COVID19 digital exodus
2018–Founding member of UKAI Projects “Ferment”
2017–2021 Nomadic Labs — Co-founder, Lead Designer
2015-17 | Milieu – Co-founder, Placemaking Initiative Designer
Entrée Nord Nouméa revitalization masterplan by Aziza Chaouni Projects and Ville de Nouméa
Digital community engagement and app design for participatory urban intervention and placemaking
City of Guelph Civic Accelerator
Working with municipal planning and GIS departments to design develop digital tools for involving citizens in the process of urban design and planning
Percy Station Ottawa
designed architectural concept and details and suppored fundraising for turning public parking lot into temporary park space
Speaking, Public Engagement, and Writings
OCAD University OnSite Gallery (forthcoming, 2026) — Cultural Fermentation & Other Messy Practices of Illegibility, co-delivery with Benjamin Lappalainen
Galeries Ontario / Ontario Galleries (2026) — Audience Engagement In The Digital Age
MUTEK Forum, Montréal (2025) — Future Festivals: Goblin Market
SAT Symposium ArtIA, Montréal (2025) — Ecological Metaphors and AI in Arts Programming
Publication
“Cache" — essay in Ways of Meaning: Terms and Conditions for Art and Technology, University of Manchester Press (forthcoming 2027, Editors: Sarah Cook and Charlotte Kent)
Future Festivals: Goblin Market, HOLO / MUTEK, 2025
Why AI Art? Why Art for AI, Canada Council for the Arts / Cultivate Grant, 2024 (Co-authors: Caroline Sinders, Antonia Valencia, Jerrold McGrath, and Kasra Goodarznezhad)
Intelligent Terrain: More-Than-Human-AI (forthcoming 2026, Editor: Willem Deisinger)
Poetics of Synthetic Language: “Pigeon Time”, 2023