Knight Arts + Tech Fellowship

Knight Arts + Tech Fellowship is sponsored by John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

Supports artists exploring innovative approaches to technology and new media, including artificial intelligence, augmented and virtual reality, immersive installations, video game design, digital fabrication, and software-based work.

Announcing the 2026 Knight Arts + Tech Fellows — United States Artists Announcing the 2026 Knight Arts + Tech Fellows Five new media artists have been named Knight Arts + Tech Fellows Other Known Tomorrows by Rhonda Holberton, 2025. Single-channel digital video animation, resin and bronze sculpture, fragrance. 9 minutes.

Video stills courtesy of the artist. Today, United States Artists announced the awardees of the 2026 Knight Arts + Tech Fellowship, an annual initiative that supports five artists with unrestricted grants of $50,000 to further their disciplines, practices and innovative approaches in technology and new media. Supported by the John S.

and James L. Knight Foundation, the Knight Arts + Tech Fellowship awards artists who are expanding the boundaries of creative practice through emerging technologies — from augmented and virtual reality to immersive installations across sound, textile, digital fabrication and software-based work. Fellows use these tools in thoughtful, radical or poetic ways, pushing the field forward and critically engaging its possibilities.

Photo documentation of Black Portal Sound Graffiti by Wes Taylor, 2024. Sound performance with Linda Hang and Stefan Perdersen. Exploration of the building through resonant tones and sound sweeps, interspersing kick drum samples from legendary house and techno songs produced by Detroit artists.

Hang recited original poems while altering the sound of their voice through sampling equipment. Black Portal Building, Detroit, MI. Photo by Stefan Perdersen.

“Through the Knight Arts + Tech Fellowship, we aim to not only strengthen the arts and technology ecosystem through long-term investment in the individuals and artistic practices that fuel innovation, but also foster a community among artists and cultural workers and continued growth across the field,” said Kristina Newman-Scott, Vice President for Arts at Knight Foundation.

“Working across various disciplines and mediums, this year’s Fellowship class offers an examination of how evolving technological systems shape our environments, behaviors, and forms of connection. Their work inspires consideration for innovation as a site of relational and communal possibility. We are thrilled to support each of these artists and we welcome their arrival and participation within our community.

” The 2026 Knight Arts + Tech Fellows works across media art, technology, performance, and community practice, united by a deep commitment to reimagining technology as a social, cultural, and embodied system rather than a purely technical or commercial one.

Across their varied practices, their work collectively explores technology’s capacity to function as an active participant in shaping or redefining our human relationships and environments. a[blood]rock by Miguel Novelo, 2024. Video.

5 minutes. Stanford University, Stanford CA. Image courtesy of the artist The 2026 Knight Arts + Tech Fellows are: LIZN'BOW (Miami) – LIZN’BOW (Liz Ferrer and Bow Ty) are a collaborative duo whose practice spans performance, video, music, immersive installation and new media.

Rooted in pop aesthetics and cultural critique, their work constructs environments that operate simultaneously as installations, performances, and digital interfaces. Miguel Novelo (San Jose) – Miguel Novelo is an interdisciplinary artist and researcher whose work combines computational media with philosophical inquiry.

Novelo’s artistic expressions include sculptures, interactive moving images, and immersive installations that make use of computer vision, custom software, photogrammetry, and game engines. Rhonda Holberton (San Jose) – Rhonda Holberton is a new media artist whose multimedia installations integrate digital and interactive technologies with traditional methods of art production.

Through these works, Holberton uses materials and platforms that physically connect human bodies via technology, revealing how the signals of digitally engineered worlds have tangible, destabilizing effects on our planet. Taeyoon Choi (Detroit) – Taeyoon Choi is an artist, writer, and educator who explores the poetics of technology and human relations.

He works with images, text, and code oftentimes in collaboration with fellow artists, experts, and community members. Wes Taylor (Detroit) – Wes Taylor is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice combines installation, video art, and sound to make a world.

His decades-long practice hones the lessons and sharpens sensibilities learned from Detroit artists who came before him, shaping his craft of sampling, referencing, and recontextualizing to demonstrate themes of placemaking, histories of entanglement with the present, and the future and the necessity of Black imagination. Distributed Web of Care by Taeyoon Choi, 2022. Vinyl on gallery wall, dimensions variable.

Graphic design by Yena Yoo. Interweaving Poetic Code, Art Sonje Center, South Korea. Photo by Ian Yang, Courtesy of Art Sonje Center.

The 2026 Fellows were selected by Knight Foundation, United States Artists and a national panel of field leaders, including: Mindy Seu, Associate Professor, UCLA Department of Design Media Arts (Los Angeles, CA); Wade Wallerstein, Associate Curator, Gray Area (San Francisco, CA); and Leo Castañeda, Multimedia Artist and Video Game Designer (Miami, FL).

To date, the Knight Arts + Tech Fellowship program has awarded twenty-five artists, each cohort working among various practices, disciplines and mediums, yet remaining grounded in storytelling, speculative thinking, knowledge sharing and education, and community engagement.

This year’s cohort continues to reflect that legacy, emboldened by a spirit of collaboration, collectivism, and experimentation across art and technology with a shared sense of care and consideration for our communities and environments. Video still from Dame Leche by LIZN'BOW, 2022. Music video funded by The Oolite Arts Ellies Award, Miami, FL.

Has screened at various galleries and festivals including Davey Fest Salt Lake, Utah, David Castillo Gallery, Miami, FL, Headlands Center for the Arts and more. Video still courtesy of the artists. About the John S.

and James L. Knight Foundation We are social investors who support a more effective democracy by funding free expression and journalism, arts and culture in community, research in areas of media and democracy, and the success of American cities and towns where the Knight brothers once published newspapers. For more, visit kf.

org . About the Knight Arts + Tech Fellowship The John S. and James L.

Knight Foundation launched the Knight Arts + Tech Fellowship in 2021 to celebrate and support artists working with innovative approaches to technology and new media.

Knight Arts + Tech Fellows use emerging technologies and media, including software and coding, immersive installation, sound art, bioart, AI, augmented and virtual reality, digital fabrication, and more, in thoughtful, radical or poetic ways to expand the field and critically contribute to its discourse. Technology may be a tool, platform, by product, or end product within an artist’s practice.

Liz Ferrer & Bow Ty (LIZN'BOW) New Media and Performance Artists Experimental Media Artist 11 Questions with Corey Pemberton 11 Questions with 2026 USA Fellow Anina Major Examining the Everyday: Wideman Davis Dance 11 Questions with 2026 USA Fellows Wideman Davis Dance