Biography
Debbie Ding is an artist-scholar working across the intersection of artistic research, technology and game studies – with professional experience as design educator, interaction designer, and game designer-developer. She is recognised for her artistic work with virtual reality, game design, data visualisation, and digital mapping as a contemporary artist and was certified as Unity Associate Game Developer in 2020. Her work was shortlisted for the President’s Young Talents 2018 and Impart Art Awards 2020 and is collected by the Australian War Memorial and Singapore Art Museum.
Notable exhibitions include Ars Electronica Features, “Radical Gaming” at HeK Basel, “Worldbuilding” at Julia Stoschek Foundation Dusseldorf, “Wikicliki” at Singapore Art Museum, “Radio Malaya” at NUS Museum, “Construction in Every Corner” at NTU Museum, Kochi Biennale, and the Singapore Biennale. Scholarships include the NTU Research Scholarship and NAC Postgraduate Scholarship (Visual Art), and funded residencies with Australian War Memorial (Canberra), Dena Foundation (Paris), and 136 Goethe Lab (Goethe-Institut Singapore). Her practice-based PhD research explores ludogeography: psychogeography in virtual worlds.
Education
- 2022–2026 (In Progress) PhD Art Design and Media, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
- 2013–2015 MA Design Interactions, Royal College of Art, London UK.
- 2003–2007 BA English Literature (Minor in Gender Studies), National University of Singapore, Singapore.
Research interests
- Artistic Research
- Contemporary Art Practice
- Game Studies
- Speculative Design
Selected exhibitions
2025
- “Pure Intention”, Singapore Biennale 2025.
- “Towards Happiness, Prosperity & Progress”, The Private Museum, Singapore.
- “Another World is Possible”, Marina Bay Sands ArtScience Museum, Singapore.
- “Construction in Every Corner”, NTU Museum, Singapore.
- “Affective Architecture”, 42 Waterloo, Singapore.
2024
- “Alternate Reality”, New Art Museum.
- “Temporal Shifts”, Ars Electronica Features, Linz, Austria.
- “Scifi Mythologies Transformed”, Science Gallery Melbourne, Australia.
2023
- “Worldbuilding”, Julia Stoschek Foundation, Dusseldorf, Germany.
- “New Eden”, Marina Bay Sands ArtScience Museum.
2022
- “In Our Veins Flow Ink and Fire”, Kochi-Muziris Biennale 2022. Kochi, India.
- “New Values”, C/O Berlin, Germany.
- “Splintered Realities”, RIXC ArtScience Festival, Riga, Latvia.
- “Mediating Asia”, National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, Taichung City, Taiwan.
- “Rendering Real”, 45th Asian American International Film Festival.
- “Yes to all”, MMMAD Festival Urbano de Arte Digital de Madrid, Spain.
- “Evolving Currents”, Esplanade Jendela Visual Art Space, Singapore.
- “Design Superpositions”, National Design Centre, Singapore.
2021
- “Data Mining Jurong”, Commission for Singapore Art Museum, at Science Centre Singapore.
- “Radical Gaming”, Haus der elektronischen Künste Basel, Switzerland.
- “Wikicliki”, Singapore Art Museum, Singapore.
- “Memory Portals”, Light to Night Festival, Asian Civilisations Museum, Singapore.
Artist-in-residency
2024
- Artist-in-residence, 136 Goethe Lab, Goethe-Institut Singapore
- Artist-in-residence, Magic Circles, Online Laboratory for Virtual Worlds. Department of Film and Media, Queen’s University, Kingston, Canada.Â
2022
- Artist-in-residence, National University of Singapore, College of Design and Engineering
2017
- Artist-in-residence, Â Australian War Memorial, Canberra, Australia
2014
- Artist-in-residence, Â (Zentrum fĂĽr Kunst und Urbanistik), Berlin, Germany
2012
- Artist-in-residence, Dena Foundation, Paris, France
- Artist-in-residence, Seoul Art Space_Mullae, South Korea
- Artist-in-residence, The Substation, Singapore