DiZen Orphaned Session
DiZen Orphaned Session is an AI-driven media art project in terms of CultTech Lab that explores
how digital memory shapes and fractures individual identity in the context of cultural displacement
how digital memory shapes and fractures individual identity in the context of cultural displacement
THE CONCEPT
DiZen: how the character emerged
DiZen [Digital Citizen] does not arrive with a biography. The character has been created in 2020 by artist Valia Paella & emerges from the architecture of the digital feed itself: genderless, ageless, unmoored from nationality. Born not from intention but from the common digital traces accumulation, DiZen is assembled entirely from digital residues: archived comments, linguistic drifts, emotional registers, and the quiet behavioral patterns algorithms catalog without consent. It is a Digital Citizen who does not belong to itself. Its identity is written by the machine, shaped by the gaze of others, and preserved by algorithm in servers long after the physical life that generated it has moved on.
The artists team developing DiZen not as a protagonist, but as a condition. It lives in the gap between the human witness and the automated archive - warmly remembered by some, coldly indexed by others, and wholly incomplete until observed. In an era where displacement fractures geographic and linguistic continuity, DiZen embodies the split self: the version frozen in outdated digital traces, and the one quietly becoming elsewhere. It asks a quiet but relentless question: who owns a memory that survives only as data? DiZen is not a portrait of a person. It is a portrait of digital memory & attention itself.
The artists team developing DiZen not as a protagonist, but as a condition. It lives in the gap between the human witness and the automated archive - warmly remembered by some, coldly indexed by others, and wholly incomplete until observed. In an era where displacement fractures geographic and linguistic continuity, DiZen embodies the split self: the version frozen in outdated digital traces, and the one quietly becoming elsewhere. It asks a quiet but relentless question: who owns a memory that survives only as data? DiZen is not a portrait of a person. It is a portrait of digital memory & attention itself.
The project
DiZen orphaned session
Memory as a Quantum Phenomenon - is a central idea: the digital trace exists in a state of uncertainty until the moment of observation. Not because it does not exist but because its meaning is undefined without an observer.
The same comment from several years ago for one person it is an important document, for another it is garbage, for DiZen itself - the only evidence of who they were.
In our research we focuse on two types of digital trace:
Intentional memory - what a person chose to preserve. Digitised photographs, diaries, friend's screenshots, archives. This is a sculpture: it stands without a viewer.
Digital residue - what remained beyond intention. Comments, likes, behavioural patterns automatically captured by the algorithm. This is a shadow: visible only when light falls on it.
DiZen exists within the second type. They are a shadow, not a sculpture. That is precisely why quantum logic operates here.
Obviously a person can delete their account. The issue is not the impossibility of deletion but the unwillingness to do so. An old account remains the only place where that version of the self still exists. To delete it means to acknowledge that this person no longer exists. This is not a technical trap. It is a human choice.
The Algorithm Imposes Identity DiZen is initially neutral: without gender, age, or nationality. But social media data gradually imposes characteristics onto them. Not their own but projections formed by others traces. The contradiction between the neutrality of the character and the specificity of the data becomes not a flaw in the concept, but its narrative.
The same comment from several years ago for one person it is an important document, for another it is garbage, for DiZen itself - the only evidence of who they were.
In our research we focuse on two types of digital trace:
Intentional memory - what a person chose to preserve. Digitised photographs, diaries, friend's screenshots, archives. This is a sculpture: it stands without a viewer.
Digital residue - what remained beyond intention. Comments, likes, behavioural patterns automatically captured by the algorithm. This is a shadow: visible only when light falls on it.
DiZen exists within the second type. They are a shadow, not a sculpture. That is precisely why quantum logic operates here.
Obviously a person can delete their account. The issue is not the impossibility of deletion but the unwillingness to do so. An old account remains the only place where that version of the self still exists. To delete it means to acknowledge that this person no longer exists. This is not a technical trap. It is a human choice.
The Algorithm Imposes Identity DiZen is initially neutral: without gender, age, or nationality. But social media data gradually imposes characteristics onto them. Not their own but projections formed by others traces. The contradiction between the neutrality of the character and the specificity of the data becomes not a flaw in the concept, but its narrative.
THE RESEARCH
Research & Production
The technical foundation of DiZen Orphaned Session is a natural language processing pipeline that analyses anonymised text data from online sources - comments, posts, replies - across two time periods for each participant: before and after their experience of displacement or significant geographic transition.
The AI does not judge, score, or rank individuals. It identifies patterns: emotional registers, linguistic shifts, semantic patterns, degrees of openness or hostility, community belonging signals. These patterns are then fed into a generative visual and video system that produces a unique DiZen portrait not a dashboard, not a report, but a character.
For this project, DiZen will be extended into a generative, AI-responsive form - adapting visually on the emotional data of each survey participant’s portrait.
Tools in active use by the artists include AI video generation platforms, LLM coding, digital collage, data moshing, and data bending. All digital research survey participant data is anonymised by design. No usernames, account identifiers, or personal information are retained. Participation in the archive component is fully opt-in. The project follows GDPR principles and will develop a clear consent and data-handling protocol during the study lab phase with expert guidance.
From plugin to portrait
DiZen Orphaned Session instead of measuring and displaying a score, the AI
translates the same underlying data into a generative artistic portrait. The shift is from surveillance to reflection, from metric to memory.
The AI does not judge, score, or rank individuals. It identifies patterns: emotional registers, linguistic shifts, semantic patterns, degrees of openness or hostility, community belonging signals. These patterns are then fed into a generative visual and video system that produces a unique DiZen portrait not a dashboard, not a report, but a character.
For this project, DiZen will be extended into a generative, AI-responsive form - adapting visually on the emotional data of each survey participant’s portrait.
Tools in active use by the artists include AI video generation platforms, LLM coding, digital collage, data moshing, and data bending. All digital research survey participant data is anonymised by design. No usernames, account identifiers, or personal information are retained. Participation in the archive component is fully opt-in. The project follows GDPR principles and will develop a clear consent and data-handling protocol during the study lab phase with expert guidance.
From plugin to portrait
DiZen Orphaned Session instead of measuring and displaying a score, the AI
translates the same underlying data into a generative artistic portrait. The shift is from surveillance to reflection, from metric to memory.
THE TEAM
Human Infrastructure
Kirill Khernov | DevOps · AI Engineer
Kirill is a DevOps and AI engineer with a Bachelor’s degree in Applied Informatics. His practice bridges robust cloud infrastructure and artificial intelligence, turning complex system architectures into reproducible, automated environments. He builds containerised and orchestrated platforms (Docker, Kubernetes) provisioned with Terraform and Ansible, and develops AI‑powered tools that generate real‑time marketing insights from voice and text data via the OpenRouter API. Among his independent projects is a Kubernetes cluster deployed from scratch following the “Kubernetes The Hard Way” methodology, fully described as code. He has also written a set of reusable Ansible roles, a multi‑stage Docker image pipeline, and a reporting stack that couples PostgreSQL with Nginx to serve auto‑generated HTML analytics. Kirill’s repository of self‑penned deep‑dives into Linux internals – from namespaces and signals to syscalls and recovery‑mode rights management – reflects his commitment to low‑level clarity. In team settings he brings hands‑on experience in AI automation work. Kirill works at the intersection of infrastructure, data, and AI, building the invisible scaffolding that lets creative and data‑driven projects operate seamlessly.The technical foundation of DiZen Orphaned Session is a natural language processing pipeline that analyses anonymised text data from online sources - comments, posts, replies - across two time periods for each participant: before and after their experience of displacement or significant geographic transition.
Valia Paella | New Media Reality Artist · Digital Ethics · ArtTech
Valia Paella is a new media artist working at the intersection of digital ethics, screen culture criticism, and ArtTech. Coming to contemporary art from the creative advertising industry, she builds a practice that examines how information environments shape identity, memory, and perception — through video art, digital collage, AI-generated imagery, sound installation, and participatory public projects. A laureate of the Russian Art Award (2021) and former lead of IAB Russia's anti-fake initiative, she combines critical media research with hands-on experience in AI tools, Web3 basics, and 3D graphics. As an ArtScience programme resident and active speaker, Valia explores algorithmic identity, attention economy, and post-digital subjectivity. Within the DiZen project, she drives the conceptual and artistic vision, integrating generative AI, NFT formats, and participatory storytelling to investigate memory, displacement, and the fluidity of digital selfhood.
Valery Zelensky | CG Artist · 3D Designer · VFX · Mapping · Touch Design Artist
For over twenty years, I’ve worked at the intersection of film, advertising, and digital art — as a CG generalist, VFX supervisor, and render artist. I’ve contributed to feature films (Viy, Vysotsky. Thank God I’m Alive, Yolki 2), animated projects (Quacked Holidays), theater productions (video mapping for the opera Turandot), and advertising campaigns. My expertise spans the entire production pipeline: from 3D modeling and animation to final compositing. I work with a wide range of tools — Houdini, Unreal Engine, Maya, Blender, ZBrush, Nuke, and generative systems like Stable Diffusion. This enables me to blend classical visualization with procedural and real-time technologies, blurring the line between the physical and the digital. A graduate of the Moscow International Film School (animation workshop), I explore the plasticity of light, the texture of motion, and the dramaturgy of visual noise in both personal and commercial projects.
Kirill is a DevOps and AI engineer with a Bachelor’s degree in Applied Informatics. His practice bridges robust cloud infrastructure and artificial intelligence, turning complex system architectures into reproducible, automated environments. He builds containerised and orchestrated platforms (Docker, Kubernetes) provisioned with Terraform and Ansible, and develops AI‑powered tools that generate real‑time marketing insights from voice and text data via the OpenRouter API. Among his independent projects is a Kubernetes cluster deployed from scratch following the “Kubernetes The Hard Way” methodology, fully described as code. He has also written a set of reusable Ansible roles, a multi‑stage Docker image pipeline, and a reporting stack that couples PostgreSQL with Nginx to serve auto‑generated HTML analytics. Kirill’s repository of self‑penned deep‑dives into Linux internals – from namespaces and signals to syscalls and recovery‑mode rights management – reflects his commitment to low‑level clarity. In team settings he brings hands‑on experience in AI automation work. Kirill works at the intersection of infrastructure, data, and AI, building the invisible scaffolding that lets creative and data‑driven projects operate seamlessly.The technical foundation of DiZen Orphaned Session is a natural language processing pipeline that analyses anonymised text data from online sources - comments, posts, replies - across two time periods for each participant: before and after their experience of displacement or significant geographic transition.
Valia Paella | New Media Reality Artist · Digital Ethics · ArtTech
Valia Paella is a new media artist working at the intersection of digital ethics, screen culture criticism, and ArtTech. Coming to contemporary art from the creative advertising industry, she builds a practice that examines how information environments shape identity, memory, and perception — through video art, digital collage, AI-generated imagery, sound installation, and participatory public projects. A laureate of the Russian Art Award (2021) and former lead of IAB Russia's anti-fake initiative, she combines critical media research with hands-on experience in AI tools, Web3 basics, and 3D graphics. As an ArtScience programme resident and active speaker, Valia explores algorithmic identity, attention economy, and post-digital subjectivity. Within the DiZen project, she drives the conceptual and artistic vision, integrating generative AI, NFT formats, and participatory storytelling to investigate memory, displacement, and the fluidity of digital selfhood.
Valery Zelensky | CG Artist · 3D Designer · VFX · Mapping · Touch Design Artist
For over twenty years, I’ve worked at the intersection of film, advertising, and digital art — as a CG generalist, VFX supervisor, and render artist. I’ve contributed to feature films (Viy, Vysotsky. Thank God I’m Alive, Yolki 2), animated projects (Quacked Holidays), theater productions (video mapping for the opera Turandot), and advertising campaigns. My expertise spans the entire production pipeline: from 3D modeling and animation to final compositing. I work with a wide range of tools — Houdini, Unreal Engine, Maya, Blender, ZBrush, Nuke, and generative systems like Stable Diffusion. This enables me to blend classical visualization with procedural and real-time technologies, blurring the line between the physical and the digital. A graduate of the Moscow International Film School (animation workshop), I explore the plasticity of light, the texture of motion, and the dramaturgy of visual noise in both personal and commercial projects.
The project is developed within the framework of CultTech Lab
All ideas, text, photo, and other materials belong to the creative team members
All ideas, text, photo, and other materials belong to the creative team members
