POEM = WORK OF ART, a discussion with Arch Hades, Melanie Lenz, Aleksandra Art, and Abigail Miller, moderated by Ana María Caballero
held at re:VERSE, the poetry symposium in London on April 23, 2025 at Ladbroke Hall. the evening was co-presented by theVERSEverse and The Tezos Foundation in partnership with The Collectors Club, Muse Frame, Digital Art Week, and The Disruptive Gallery.
about the panelists
Abigail Miller is Artist and Partnership Lead at Avant Arte, spearheading their digital art program and business development. Avant Arte exists to bring the work of outstanding artists to a new generation by developing programmes that cross pollinate culture, commerce and creativity. She additionally was a founding member of Unit London’s Web3 and Digital Art department in 2020 and leading it become one of the first art galleries in entering the art and tech space, recognising the potential for unparalleled transparency, access and liberty for generations of digital artists who have struggled to build careers in the traditional art ecosystem. Before transitioning into the art world, Abigail graduated with degrees in Blockchain Security focusing on Terrorism and Nuclear Non-proliferation. Additionally, she was a Fulbright in Russia where she worked with various museums and art institutions. She holds a MA from Courtauld Institute of Art and has worked with various auction houses, museums, and private collections based in Eastern Europe, London, and the United States.
Arch Hades (b.1992) is a London-based artist and bestselling poet with a background in politics and philosophy. Her practice spans painting, sculpture, and performance, and she is the author of six volumes of poetry. Working at the intersection of visual art and spoken word, Hades’ practice expands on the Romantic lyricism of her poetry, mining subjects ranging from personal loss to contemporary angst and existentialist questions.
Aleksandra Art, Head of Arts at Trilitech, Tezos Ecosystem. Aleksandra is a leader at the intersection of art and technology, with extensive experience in Web3 art projects. She is the Head of Arts at Trilitech, the hub for driving adoption and core technology on the Tezos blockchain. Aleksandra is a prominent speaker, writer, and educator on the role of decentralized technologies in the creative sector. Aleksandra holds a Master’s degree in Art Business from Sotheby’s Institute of Art and co-founded Electric Artefacts in 2020, a curatorial advisory focused on digital art and blockchain projects. As the Ambassador and former Director of Partnerships at .ART, Aleksandra played a key role in launching the .art top level domain in 2016, overseeing strategic partnerships to foster the embrace of technology in the art world, including collaborations with Rhizome and Ars Electronica, and spearheading the Digital Innovation in Art Award.
Melanie Lenz is curator of Digital Art at the Victoria and Albert Museum where she is responsible for developing the V&A’s digital art collections. She has organised multiple exhibitions, most recently co-curating Patric Prince: Digital Art Visionary (2023-2024). She co-edited the book Digital Art: 1960 to Now (2024) and has published on diverse topics including generative art (2024), early computer art in Latin America (2018), gender, art and technology (2014), collecting and conserving digital art (2011). Melanie has led on a broad range of public programmes including developing a digital art season, convened conferences on art, design and new technologies for health, and has initiated art partnerships with a variety of organisations including Women Who Code and Great Ormond Street Hospital. Based in London, Melanie also works as a freelance curator. She is a judge for the Lumen Prize for Art and Technology and a panel expert for the National Archives.
Ana María Caballero is a multiple award-winning, transdisciplinary artist. Her work explores how biology delimits societal and cultural rites, ripping the veil from romanticized motherhood and questioning notions that package sacrifice as a virtue. She’s the recipient of an Academy of American Poets Prize, the Beverly International Literature Prize, Colombia’s José Manuel Arango National Poetry Prize, the Steel Toe Books Poetry Prize, a Future Art Writers Award and a Sevens Foundation Grant. She’s the first living poet to sell a poem in the history of Sotheby’s, and the only artist ever to receive a triple finalist nomination for the Lumen Prize. Her work has been featured by BOMB, Poets.org, El País, the MAXXI BVLGARI Prize, Poets & Writers, been a finalist for the Vassar Miller Prize and exhibited at the V&A, HEK Basel, the Francisco Carolinum, the Ashmolean Museum, and Times Square, amongst other leading museums, galleries and public spaces worldwide. The author of six books, she’s also the co-founder of digital poetry gallery theVERSEverse.
