By Izabel Mensah 

On Jan. 29, six new media students at Toronto Metropolitan University showcased their ingenious creativity and modern designs during opening night of the program’s latest art exhibition Weaved/Wired 2026: Iridescent Autonomy. 

Organized by the New Media Exhibition Team (NEXT), the show displays tangible artworks utilizing playful interactive mechanics. 

The theme strives to demonstrate a “childlike wonder and critique of contemporary systems,” inviting viewers to “pause within the present moment,” according to the NEXT website. 

NEXT president and fourth-year new media student Madeline Dam Hoang shares the sentiment behind the exhibition. “New media is honestly a very small program, and we want to highlight that community and the artists there,” Hoang told The Eyeopener.

Pathological Entanglement, made by fourth-year new media student Angelo Govas, sheds light on systemic stigmas enforced by medical sanism. The piece draws on his personal experience with medical institutions and the Canadian healthcare system. 

For Govas, Pathological Entanglement captures feelings of entrapment and isolation— through an electronically puppeteered hand intertwined in a web of strings, confined in a glass box.

“Entrapment comes to mind because the piece deals with the idea of losing your autonomy to medical practitioners and getting lost in that cycle of care,” said Govas. 

Second-year new media student Ashley Hannah reimagines the concept of a Slinky with her musical and colourful art piece Ultra Slinky Sonic Playground. Through sound, textures and ultrasonic sensors, Hannah’s rainbow slinky lights up the exhibition space.

Shared Network by second-year new media student Ranjit Khela offers the opportunity for visitors to create music together: it builds on interconnection, harmony and the human desire to find community within our surroundings. Platformed on a black box labelled “embrace this sound,” Shared Network has knobs to adjust the tones emitting from the box. 

“My goal for this project was to get it in an exhibition and have four random people that don’t know each other just randomly connect and make sound together. I found that to be really beautiful,” said Khela.

Since 2023, NEXT exhibitions present a stage for new media students to promote and support their innovative project pieces created during past semesters. Fourth-year new media student and artist coordinator of the event, Jessica Clarke-Joyce, highlights the importance of such exhibitions and what it means for  the community. 

“To see your work in a gallery is so important for artists because it helps decide their future and where they want to be and where they want to go,” said Clarke-Joyce. 

“We’ve been doing that since the beginning, and it means a lot more than just presenting art. It’s representing new media and having that annual exhibition to showcase what we’re made out of,” said Hoang.