Biography

Adriana Varella is a multi-disciplinary artist who makes audio-installations, photographs, drawings, performances, video-art-experimentations, computer installations, and site specific/public art works. They create and organize the AnarkoArtLab in NYC. Digital DNA is a public art project commissioned by the Palo Alto Public Arts Commission for Lytton Plaza in downtown Palo Alto, California. The sculpture addresses themes of technology and public space in Silicon Valley; the hub of technological innovation and advancement. It was created and installed in 2005. The sculpture has an intense and controversial history: Adriana's neighbor mistook the unfinished work for junk and threw it out; the first sculpture was totally destroyed by fire (there are suspicions that this fire was set on purpose); two weeks prior to the unveiling, Digital DNA was vandalized. In August 2017, the city staff issued a report recommending removal because of the cost of maintenance. In 2017, when the art commission removed the sculpture after 12 years of installation, it become the symbol of the city. In response, more than 60 individuals protested and Adriana wrapped the sculpture in a tarp labeled "CENSORED". In 2018, the sculpture was purchased by an anonymous art collector - a Silicon Valley entrepreneur and a Harvard University graduate. The sculpture was removed from Lytton Plaza in June 2018. The Harvard Business School displays the restored work, as of 2019, outside of the iLab on Western Avenue.