Melissa F. ‘MF’ Clarke is an interdisciplinary artist whose work integrates generative and procedural processes. Clarke works across media to explore interconnections between natural systems and technological structures—drawing from science, mythology, data, and systems of information. Her practice challenges the separation between these realms, revealing how they are intertwined through multi-sensory (audio-visual) experiences, perfromances and printed works.

Since the early 2000s, Clarke has worked extensively with bathymetric and geophysical datasets, studying glaciers and the underwater landscapes they have shaped. Her process has included the use of computer vision and generative algorithms to composite and transform this data over time, forming audio-visual environments that evoke both deep time and speculative futures.

Her recent sound retrospective Arrays, published by Oxtail Recordings, spans a decade of related sonic works and includes field recordings from her Arctic residency, where she spent a month traveling up the west coast of Greenland conducting research and collecting sound, imagery, and data. The album received reviews from The Wire and A Closer Listen.

Through installations such as Polar, Untitled Antarctica, and Sila, Clarke seeks to reconnect data collected from beneath glaciers with their organic origins. Using sound, video projection, and glass sculpture, she constructs neo-landscapes that give physical form to information gathered from these under-water terrains. Her work also includes data and research from the fields of nanophysics, zoology, meteorology, astronomy, and information security.

Clarke has held residencies with the Frank-Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry at Carnegie Mellon, New Inc, Clocktower at Pioneer Works, Works on Water, Sanctuary Cities, Visible Future Labs, and the Simons Center for Geometry and Physics. She has exhibited and performed at venues including Eastern Bloc, the Center for New Music (San Francisco), Federal Hall, Knockdown Center, Pioneer Works, the Interactive Art Fair, Eyebeam, and Issue Project Room, and in programs with the Parrish and Queens Museums.

Her work has been featured in The Wire, A Closer Listen, Art F City, Creators Project, L Magazine, Art in America, and Impose Magazine. Clarke holds a master’s degree from NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program (ITP) and has taught interactive and computational art at SUNY Stony Brook and NYU IDM. She currently teaches art and technology in NYU Steinhardt’s Curatorial Program.

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