Ava Mirage Wanbli is a new media artist and performer based in Chicago, IL. Her practice traverses the boundaries between virtual and physical worlds, weaving together persona, body, and technology. Through the use of video game engines, live performance, installations, sculpture, video, and her own body, Ava constructs immersive experiences that question the nature of selfhood, presence, and becoming. Her work investigates how performing for the camera and creating virtual reconstructions of the body—through 3D scanning, avatar creation, and virtual environments—can collapse temporal boundaries, offering an archive of the body and a vision of future selves.
By augmenting forms of authorship and intimacy, Ava reclaims her narrative and repositions the voyeur's gaze within the technological landscape. She confronts the viewer with complex trans narratives, exploring themes of hyper-sexualization, fetishization, and the body's role in both self-determination and subjugation in a world of consumption within persona economies.
Ava received her Master of Fine Arts from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2019. In addition to her artistic practice, she has served as an educator in several art institutions over the past four years. She has exhibited at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art and the Depaul Art Museum in Chicago. She is the recipient of the 3Arts New Wave Artist Award and has been named Break Out Artist of The Year for 2024 in New City Magazine in Chicag. has participated in the ACRE and New Art City residencies. Her work has been featured in New City Magazine and Sixty Inches In The Middle Publications. Ava continues to organize and create spaces for dialogue around the complexities of being a trans woman, using her practice to confront, educate, and elevate narratives of hyper-visibility and embodied selfhood.
Artist Statement PDF