Renaissance-21 Festival - Talk + Exhibition Tour

The Next Renaissance: Reimagining Heritage in Contemporary Arts

During Frieze Week 2026, Renaissance-21 presents The Next Renaissance: Reimagining Heritage in Contemporary Arts at art’otel London Hoxton (official partner of Frieze) - a conversation between Nigerian-British artist and creative technologist Chidirim Nwaubani, curator and researcher Alexandra Dolgosheina, and composer and pianist Teodor Doré, moderated by Nour Saleh, founder of Art Breath, on a central question of contemporary culture: how can we engage with the past without simply preserving or reproducing it?

At the center of the event is Mbari Memorial, the most ambitious installation to date by Nigerian-British artist and creative technologist Chidirim Nwaubani, founder of LOOTY and recipient of a Webby Award. Nwaubani’s work has been presented internationally, including projects associated with the Venice Biennale and Frieze Week London, and has been featured by The New York Times, BBC News and Reuters.

Inspired by the traditional Mbari Houses of the Igbo people, Mbari Memorial transforms the gallery at art’otel Hoxton into an immersive environment exploring cultural restitution, collective memory and the future of the museum. Combining bronze sculpture, large-scale digital environments, archival imagery, sound and interactive technology, the exhibition invites visitors to become active participants: sculptural interfaces respond to touch, generating evolving digital artworks in real time. Rather than defining restitution simply as the return of lost objects, Nwaubani proposes it as an ongoing process of cultural imagination and collective creation.

The exhibition becomes the starting point for The Next Renaissance, a conversation between Nwaubani; Alexandra Dolgosheina, curator and researcher whose experience includes Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Sotheby’s and Hayward Gallery; and composer and pianist Teodor Doré, the first musician authorised by the Rachmaninoff family to create an orchestral realisation of Rachmaninoff’s long-lost Suite in D minor, ahead of its world premiere at Carnegie Hall in November 2026. The conversation will be moderated by Nour Saleh, founder of Art Breath.

Together, they bring three distinct approaches to recovering cultural memory - digital restitution, experimental curating, and the reconstruction of lost musical heritage - to a discussion about some of the most urgent questions facing culture today: Who owns cultural memory? Can technology recover what history has lost? Where does preservation end and contemporary authorship begin? And what happens to authenticity in the age of AI?

Following the discussion, Chidi Nwaubani will personally lead guests through Mbari Memorial, revealing the ideas, technologies and cultural histories behind the installation.

Participants:

Chidi Nwaubani – Artist and Founder of LOOTY

Nour Saleh – Founder of Art Breath, Artist, Writer, Moderator

Alexandra Dolgosheina- Independent curator, Co-founder of FAX Gallery, scent researcher, and visual arts professional

Teodor Doré – Composer, Pianist and Co-founder of Renaissance-21

The discussion will be followed by a guided tour of Chidi Nwaubani's exhibition Mbari Memorial at art'otel London Hoxton.

Renaissance-21 Festival

http://renaissance21.world/festival

Oct 15th, National Liberal Club, Lounge, 7 p.m.– 8:30 p.m.

Oct 18th, Art'otel London Hoxton. 1:30 p.m.– 4 p.m. talk+exhibition tour

Oct 22nd – National Liberal Club, David Lloyd George Room, 6 p.m.–9 p.m.

Festival partner - AZ Real Estate ®

https://www.azrealestate.uk/

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For media enquiries, please contact:

art’otel Press Office

T: +44 (0)7523 336366

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About art’otel:

● PPHE Hotel Group, an international hospitality and real estate company with already a strong London presence through its Park Plaza properties, wholly owns the art’otel® brand.

● art’otel, powered by Radisson Hotels, is a contemporary collection of premium lifestyle hotels, each inspired by a Signature Artist, forming a cultural, gastronomic and social hub in the most creative areas of the most interesting cities, filled with warm, welcoming, helpful team members and discerning, cosmopolitan guests, buzzing with life all year round, in buildings as striking and individual as the stunning art they host.

● art’otel London Battersea Power Station will be the UK’s first art’otel managed by Park Plaza Hotels, with art’otel London Hoxton following in 2024.

● art’otel’s entire concept focuses on original art displayed from Signature Artists and at art’otel London Battersea Power Station Jaime Hayon, who is also the hotel’s interior designer, has been selected bringing a bold, colourful and playful aesthetic to the hotel’s guest rooms and public areas.

● art’otels can be found in Amsterdam, London Battersea, London Hoxton, Berlin, Rome and Zagreb.

About PPHE Hotel Group:

PPHE Hotel Group (LSE: PPH) is an international hospitality real es

Description supplied by the event organiser.