Closing Talk: Who is building the future?

Maya Man (b. 1996, Pennsylvania, USA) is an artist focused on pop culture’s soft power and contemporary identity on the internet. Her work examines dominant narratives around femininity, authenticity, and the performance of self. She has exhibited or performed at Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC; MOCA, Los Angeles; bitforms, NYC; MoMu, Antwerp; SOOT, Tokyo; and the V&A, London. Her work has been featured in Art in America, Document, Los Angeles Review of Books, and CURA among other publications. Her work is included in the permanent collection of the Walker Art Center.

Website: http://mayaontheinter.net/

David Teh is a writer, curator and Associate Professor at the National University of Singapore, researching Southeast Asian modern and contemporary art. His curatorial projects have included Misfits: Pages from a Loose-leaf Modernity (HKW Berlin, 2017), Returns (12th Gwangju Biennale, 2018) and the 17th Istanbul Biennial (with Ute Meta Bauer and Amar Kanwar, 2022). Most recently, he served as Artistic Co-director of Thailand Biennale Phuket, 2025-26. David’s publications have included Thai Art: Currencies of the Contemporary (MIT Press, 2017) and Artist-to-Artist: Independent Art Festivals in Chiang Mai 1992-98 (co-edited with David Morris; Afterall, 2018).