MITRA FABIAN
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2021, Google, Mountain View, CA
I was commissioned to create four pieces for Google's headquarters through their Artist in Residence program. Each piece was designed with specific computing theories in mind: Cat State, Quantum Gate, Gradient Ascent, and Hidden Layer. I used resistors on foam core to articulate each of these themes.
resistors on archival foam core, 48"h x 96"w
Describe your image
resistors on archival foam core, 48"h x 96"w
COMMISSIONS
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2021, Private Collection, Los Altos, CA
SITE-SPECIFIC INSTALLATIONS
Seeping Through Domestic Dissonance, 2025
NUMU (New Museum Los Gatos), Los Gatos, CA
"Fabian’s haunted cabin of obsolete resistors, capacitors, and diodes, their metal wiring contrasting with their bright color coding, and the slip-cast sprouting fungal growths that have claimed and reanimated them, all serve as a warding-off of evil, an appeasing nod to the fire gods, as well as psychic grounding for traumatized disaster victims."
-DeWitt Cheng
Read the full review
"Rise and Fall", 2025
Washi tape
Koumimachi Kogen Museum, Koumi Town, Japan
I used hundreds of feet of washi tape donated by MT to festoon the walls of the museum.
To and Fro, 2022
ceramic, resistors, repurposed and altered rocker
Rhizome, 2018-22
resistors
Arrival Window, Minnow Arts, Santa Cruz, CA
This show featured kinetic sculptures and a site-specific installation with resistors. See more photos on Minnow Arts' website
Divested, 2014
microfiche
One Site, Thacher Gallery, University of San Francisco
I created this installation with hundreds of rolls of microfiche that the USF library planned to get rid of. I used the unique light fixtures, inverted domes, to highlight the beauty of this material that teeters on the edge of obsolescence.
5,500 Into the Deep, 2012
5,500 feet of industrial tape
One of my largest installations was exhibited at Don Soker Contemporary Art in San Francisco for my solo show Concentric. This industrial tape swelled and oozed in a hauntingly raw space. Ken Baker of the San Francisco Chronicle said this of the exhibit: "A young San Jose artist makes a strong San Francisco debut with works in materials accumulated to the point where they challenge her control. Pleasing, unplanned effects result when she clusters together scores of glass pipettes or stuffs a backlighted plastic box with film."
Heavy is the Sea of Trees, 2012
Plaster, cardboard, plastic netting, vellum
This installation was created during my residency at Centre d'art Marnay in France. The rural environment was home to tree farms, a potato factory, and many, many insects. A previous resident left a bag of plaster behind; that combined with the cardboard and plastic from the potato factory was what gave me the impetus to create this dream-like setting.
Hover, 2009
Plastic film
I created this installation during my residency at Bemis Center for the Arts, in Omaha, NE. The combination of the industrial space and special lighting had a magical, reflective effect on this translucent film.
Ventilate II (detail), 2007
window blinds
This installation was exhibited at the San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art for my solo show Propogate. Working with this substance is a quintessential example of repurposing, transforming, and activating a humble utilitarian material.
Ventilate II & I, 2007
Room for Recovery, 2005
Tape, mixed media
This was my thesis show for my MFA at Cal State, Northridge. This was my first foray into a full embrace of working with manufactured materials. I chose tape because it became it allowed me to build with immediacy, achieve translucency, and transform an everyday material.
Video Press
installing B9 at JayJay, Sacramento CA
read the review here