About the Operator Salon

“The salon is intended to be a messy gathering of minds and contradicting opinions, with an alternative mission to the constant ‘professional’ presentation of self and work we’ve all become so accustomed to.”

The Operator Salon has been named as such, firstly as a conversation-focused appendage to the duo’s art house, Operator. And secondly, in order to pay homage to the queer couple Gertrude Stein and Alice B Toklas’ salons in the 1930s, which hosted the likes of Picasso and Hemingway. The salon merges their expertise in art and technology with their love for conversation, culture and critical thinking. It is an evolving space to experience interesting, influential, creative minds flow together with a starting point and no desired end point.

Naturally Ania and Dejha’s ‘2.0 version’ has a slight departure from the original salons of the 1930s, due to the fact its first iteration took place digitally, as well as its topical focus on technology. Through curated conversations, the duo explores technology’s both obvious and nuanced effects on culture, art, design, love, sex, politics, and life. The first installment of the Operator Salon debuted at the Crypto and Digital Art Fair in Paris 17-23 June 2021 and included conversations on Digital Fashion, AI Art, as well as Art Infrastructures for Advanced Technologies.