BEST FRIEND
Video, 2025
About the artwork
Best Friend unfolds as a gesture of gratitude to friends, family, and lovers. It drifts between the intimacy of a dream and the watchfulness of a surveillance state, where moments feel at once private and exposed.
The work lingers in the paradox of tenderness and unease: a romantic celebration of the fleeting, as if no one is watching, yet preserved with the weight of permanence. Rather than looking back in regret, it honors the fragile beauty of presence, inscribing ephemeral encounters as though etched in stone.
ABCDJ
Audio explanation
Listen to ABCDJ discuss this work.
ABCDJ is an artist and musician based in Chicago, Illinois. Working with AI image, video, and music tools since 2021, their practice bridges experimental technology and emotional realism. With a background in music production and songwriting, ABCDJ explores themes of romance, solitude, and surrealism through what they describe as a “bubblegum slacker” aesthetic—a fusion of nostalgic imperfection and contemporary digital media. Their work has been exhibited internationally, including Contract of Fiction at P61 Gallery in Berlin and The Noocene: Computation and Cosmology from Antikythera to AI at the 19th Venice Architecture Biennale.