Flourishing is an artistic research project initiated by Alexandra Reill in the spring of 2026. It focuses on examining recent developments in flourishing research and exploring how flourishing futurity can be built. What is needed to guide futurity toward florurishing? Or: To guide flourishing to futurity?
Currently, FLOURISHING consists of the following modules:
MODULE 01:
SERIES OF RESEARCH PAPERS
(2000–5000 characters; number of characters varies per paper)
— Resources for Flourishing Within Self-Image-Shaping Digital Environments
currently under peer review by Via Gluck 62. Beyond the Image Art Prize
— Writing Contemporary Myth Through Listing: The nfhfpa Project
currently under peer review by Leonardo. MIT Press
— Bricolage and Its Capacity to Create Myth in the Contemporary Arts
currently under peer review by Leonardo. MIT Press
MODULE 02:
2026. FROM SP19-22. ABOUT A WOMAN WHO IS NO LONGER RECOGNIZABLE
In an age in which digital images increasingly mediate memory, self-understanding, social recognition, and everyday experience, the central question of this work is not how accurately an image represents a person, but what conditions enable a person to flourish within an image-saturated environment. The experimental video reflects current conditions.
MODULE 03:
AIR BORMES: BLOSSOMING
The wall installation AIR Bormes: Blossoming consists of a 3c / 4c series of individual photographs and (looping) very short films, as well as photo and video series, each of which has its own title. All of these works depict lush, growing, and blooming plants.
The photographs were taken in spring 2026 during a week-long residency in southern France undertaken by Alexandra Reill. After reviewing all the photographs, the artist found it remarkable that, unlike on any other trip she had ever taken, and apparently unconsciously—with the exception of only a very few, isolated shots that were essentially those of a tourist—she had photographed exclusively plants and flowers.
Whether her fascination with and admiration for a plant world of such exuberance—one she had never before experienced, both in its locally specific diversity and its overall characteristics—had a retroactive effect on her subconscious, or whether the choice of subjects occurred in the reverse order, remains an open question.
An initial review of all the works in this module has been completed, as has the development of working titles for the individual sub-works. The current task is to finalize the work titles and the display formats for the individual images and videos. This will be followed by a review of the sub-works to determine their arrangement in relation to one another, as well as the presentation format and the calculation of the spatial dimensions of the wall installation.
Until this is complete, inquiries regarding individual works or sub-series are welcome.
MODULE 04:
A GLASS OF WATER
The photograph A Glass of Water reflects known and unknown options for creating a future in the here and now. The exhibition of the piece could be accompanied by text excerpts from the artistic research on the topic.
MODULE 05:
FLOURISHING: WITH LUKAS IN THE MORE THAN LUSHLY BLOOMING SONNWENDVIERTEL
A minimal interpretative-documentary photo series from spring 2026 on wealth of moments experienced together in seven months …
alexandra reill, 2026 [în progress]
series of three photographies
For further infos and high resoluton images, please send a message to info [at] kanonmedia [dot] com.
kanonmedia / vie / a / 26–
The digital series of the original photographs was gifted to Lukas Kaltenbäck by the artist in 2026 and is part of his private art collection.
The overall project is divided into the above and maybe more structural modules, which are created “in the flow,” so to speak, during the ongoing research process. In terms of content, these segments may overlap, and in both respects—content and form-wise, creative invention occurs. In both respects the way it emerges can be varied in the different modules or may occur without any changes applied simultaneously.
The topic of flourishing, with its diverse and often mutually or multidirectionally influencing components, can only be considered as a meta-question. Therefore, this trans-, inter-, and anti-disciplinary project considers only a narrow range of aspects individually selected by the artist and researcher. Currently, the author is primarily concerned with the following topics in the context of flourishing:
“Classical” contemporary research approaches (cf. from happiness research, positive psychology, and cognitive sciences); contemporary spirituality research (“flourishing as narrative and the creation of myth”); creativity and artistic research (including a look at keeping lists for writing stories and the analysis of artistic projects that work with them; “spatialization” of flourishing); influences of social inequalities on general well-being (including a look at the formation of social structures through access to common goods); innovative monitoring and evaluation strategies in (artistic) research projects.