Oliver Blank is a British-Persian artist, photographer, and composer. His work is often about affection and intimacy.

Oliver’s work instills a shared romance and sense of connection. Past installations include composing orchestral music for long forgotten buildings and hosting a phone-line that collects messages for lost loves and forgotten friendships. Oliver’s artwork has appeared across the world in countries including Japan, Mexico, Spain, Finland, and the USA, and venues including Tate Gallery, London's Design Museum, and the Victoria & Albert Museum.

Oliver also gives public talks about intimacy and affection. A regular speaker and workshop leader at SXSW, Oliver has been a member of the advisory board of SXSW Eco, and a Practitioner-in-Residence at Berkeley, University of California. You may also have caught him in Wired, the BBC, The New York Times, and CNN.

Raised in Manchester, England, over the years Oliver has lived in Helsinki, London, New Orleans, Oakland, and San Francisco. He currently resides in Brooklyn, New York.

Find Oliver on INSTAGRAM or email OLLY@MROLIVERBLANK.COM

SELECTED WORKS

2022
Confessional Music Recomposed, Full-length Album
Cat King - Cha Ching, Full-length Album
Oregon Daily Tele-Pome Line with Anis Mojgani, Telephone number based in Portland, Oregon
A Consensus of One, Music Single

2021
Kalevala, Music Single
Music for a Love Affair, Music Single
The One Who Got Away: Season 2, Podcast Series
Listen To New Orleans by Sarrah Danziger (Oliver contributed technical consultation on installation execution), public installation in New Orleans

2020
The One Who Got Away: Season 2, Podcast Series
Fin, Full-length Album
The End of the Day by April Soetarman (Oliver contributed sound design and consultation on installation concept/execution), public installation in New York and Los Angeles

2018
The One Who Got Away: Season 1, Podcast Series
Friendship Lab, Interlochen Center for the Arts, Interlochen, Michigan
Sound Expeditions, Indiana State Museum, Indianapolis, Indiana

2017
How To Leave It All Behind (with Asha Jimenez), me Convention, Frankfurt, Germany
The Last Conservatory (with Asha Jimenez), Serenbe, Georgia
How To Leave It All Behind (with Asha Jimenez), Serenbe Farms, Serenbe, Georgia
Solution or Utopia?, The Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
The Lady & The Stone, The Battery, San Francisco, CA
Music For Forgotten Places, Museo Del Chopo, Mexico City, Mexico

2016
Music For Forgotten Places, Museo Del Chopo, Mexico City, Mexico

2014
The One Who Got Away, Columbus, Indiana
Waiting, Columbus, Indiana
The Bureau of Manufactured History, Indiana University Center for Art and Design, Columbus, Indiana
OHRDRONE: Drone Chamber 2  (with Toby Heys), Broken City Labs’ Civic Space, Windsor, ONT, Canada

2013
OHRDRONE: Drone Chamber 1  (with Toby Heys), Museum of Architecture and Design, Ljubljana, Slovenia
Music for Forgotten Places, Fiskars Village, Finland
The Kalevala  (with Anna Emilia Laitinen and Kalle Karjalainen), Online
The Bureau of Manufactured History (with James A. Reeves),  We Are City, Indianapolis, IN
The Sound of the Bureau of Manufactured History, Limited Edition Flexi Disc

2012
Music for Forgotten Places, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo, A Coruña, Spain
Pyramid, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo, A Coruña, Spain
Sampsa & The Swan (for Tracey Moberly’s Tweet Me Up), The Tanks, Tate Modern, London, England
Confessional Music (for Candy Chang's Confessions), The Cosmopolitan, Las Vegas
Confessional Music, Full-length Album, Distributed Globally

2011
60,000,000 to 1, Shush Gallery, Helsinki, Finland
CloqWork (with Akio Nagano), iOS App for Apple Devices
Häiti Chérie (for Sasha Huber's Häiti Chérie), Kluuvi Gallery, Helsinki, Finland
JaNY's Theme  (for Sasha Huber's I LOVE JaNY), Logomo, Turku, Finland
Balloon Suite (soundtrack for Jake Elliott's Balloon Diaspora), Mini Album

2010
JaNY's Theme  (for Sasha Huber's I LOVE JaNY), Taidehalli Studio, Helsinki, Finland
Cope (with Päivi Vettenranta), Vertical Exile, Stockholm, Sweden
Cope (with Päivi Vettenranta), Human Culture, Imatra, Finland
A Tool Through Which To Experience The City, Online
Karhu ja Tiikerini, Full-length Album
Karhunpeijaiset, Animated Film

2009
Minimal Bling (with Geraldine Juárez), The Free Art and Technology Lab (F.A.T.)
iRedux, Mind On Fire, Manchester, UK

2008
Fabrikan (with Roma Levin), Victoria & Albert Museum (V&A), London, UK
Habitat , New Interfaces In Musical Expression (NIME), Genoa, Italy

2007
Plug (with Roma Levin), Great Brits: Ingenious Therapies, Milan, Italy
Hospitality (with Jeremy Keenan), Shunt Gallery, London, UK

2006
Climatized Objects (with Roma Levin), The Design Museum, London, UK
Climatized Objects (with Roma Levin), Salone Internazionale del Mobile, Milan, Italy

TALKS, WORKSHOPS, PERFORMANCES

2021
The Purpose Myth Live, Online

2020
The One Who Got Away, Online
Quarantine Confessions, Online & Felix Meritis, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Hot Takes, Online

2018
Global Service Design Jam, Lisbon, Portugal

2017
me Convention, Frankfurt, Germany
Blum Center, University of California, Berkeley
Trade Craft, San Francisco, California
People Centered Internet, Palo Alto, California
Swissnex, San Francisco, California
SXSW, Austin, Texas
Google.org, San Francisco, California

2016
Goat Salon, Mule Gallery, San Francisco, California
Museo Del Chopo, Mexico City, Mexico
SXSW, Austin, Texas
SXSW Eco, Austin, Texas
University of York, York, UK

2015
Interact, The British Museum, London, UK
Goldsmiths College, University of London, London, UK
SXSW Eco, Austin, Texas
California College of the Arts, San Francisco, California

RESIDENCIES & AWARDS

Artist & Designer Residency, Interlochen Center for the Arts, Michigan, USA (2018)
City State Residency, Indianapolis, Indiana, USA (2017)
Serenbe Artist Residency, Serenbe, Georgia, USA (2017)
Berkeley Practitioner in Residence, University of California, Berkeley (2017)
United Nations Humanitarian Summit Innovation Award, Istanbul, Turkey (2016)
Civic Space Residency, Broken City Labs, Windsor, Ontario, Canada (2014)
Fiskars Artist Residency, Fiskars Village, Finland (2013)
We Are City Artist Residency, Indianapolis, Indiana (2013)
Museo de Arte Contemporaneo Artist Residency, A Coruña, Spain (2013)

SELECTED PRESS

KQED. “An Artist Creates a Place to Grieve on Twitch During Holidays in Lockdown” by Juli Fraga, Dec 21, 2020
Wired. “Twitch Support Groups Are an Unlikely Source of Solace” by Juli Fraga, May 10, 2020.
Guardian. “Oliver Blank's Kalevala: The art of building an album as an app” Oct 1, 2010