StarQuest by Maya Man - bitforms gallery

StarQuest2026

Custom generative software (color, sound)Dimensions variable Edition of 1, 1 AP

StarQuest is a generative software work composed of 111 AI-generated scenes that looks to the world of American competitive dance to reflect the demands of contemporary online presentation. Produced solely using text-to-video and text-to-music models, the work draws from the artist's upbringing in the competition dance world: a hyper-feminine, performative environment where young dancers are trained to present themselves with ambition, polish, and discipline. The work specifically restages scenes and dialogue from Dance Moms, a Lifetime reality series set inside the high-intensity competition dance world, incorporating elaborate costumes, dramatic makeup, confessional interviews, and backstage rituals. Each eight-second clip functions as a scene in a fictional season of StarQuest—a title referencing a real competition the artist attended in her youth. Though the visual language is recognizable, the choreography veers into the uncanny: legs bend in impossible directions, two dancers merge into one. The competitive precision of dance becomes destabilized by the logic of artificial intelligence. StarQuest debuted in November 2025 with Feral File, curated by Nora O’Murchú. In Feral File’s online presentation, 111 one-of-one scenes were introduced with Man’s custom-built software for generating episodes by combining selected scenes. The bitforms gallery presentation further contextualizes the Feral File premiere of StarQuest, situating the software work alongside digital behind-the-scenes material and a physical box set. By merging autobiographical memory with AI hallucination, Man interrogates the mechanics of performance, the aesthetics of optimization, and the ways that selfhood is shaped by systems of competition and quantification. StarQuest reflects the instability of “reality” today, leaving viewers caught inside its infinite loop as the dancer—and the model—work endlessly to win.