Open Lab: House of Bioplastic

Karina Fernandez is alumni of the department of Digital Arts and will work at AIL from 2 until 28 March 2026. During her residency, Karina Fernandez opens her studio doors every Tuesday and Thursday to the public. In form of open lab moments and informal get-togethers Fernandez offers insights into ongoing experiments, spatial prototypes, and material processes, encouraging dialogue with visitors.

Karina Fernandez develops installative, process-based works involving biological materials and discarded matter to address environmental questions. Her practice explores the sensory clash between organic and synthetic elements through assemblage and time-based operations, that she describes as “neo-conglomerates” – a term rooted in classical geology and oriented toward contemporary sedimentation processes in which human-produced materials become part of the environment. Karina Fernandez previously earned degrees in Fine Arts and Visual Arts in Buenos Aires, and completed her diploma in Digital Arts in 2023 in the class of Ruth Schnell at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna.

During the residency at AIL, Karina Fernandez develops House of Bioplastics as a material-based research lab in which bioplastic mixtures, plant fibers, and light-based setups are systematically tested and translated into spatial prototypes. The project includes the production and comparative arrangement of material samplers, objects, and large-scale bioplastic sheets in back-lit displays, the further development of a large-scale version of her previous work Bon(e)fire, as well as workshops and informal get-togethers focused on knowledge exchange around bioplastic and fiber-based processes.