About

Mirena Rhee is a Bulgarian-American Multiplanetary and Video Game artist working across painting, installation, performance, and digital environments. She paints Mars, and she builds participatory works that invite the public to act. Her practice draws on years of making 3D worlds for Lucasfilm and Activision on Star Wars, Iron Man, and X-Men, and on large scale public projects in New York. She was personally recognized by George Lucas for her contributions to Star Wars.

Mirena works with natural resins and pigments in layered Old Masters techniques, and with ink drawings on cotton rag. She also creates animations and augmented reality pieces that extend the work into public space.

Her public installations have appeared on Times Square, Union Square, the World Trade Center, the Armory Show, Chelsea, Governors Island, Dumbo, and in Leicester Square in London. She created a series of Giant Hands works in Beacon, in Central Park, and on Broadway in New York City.

She collaborated closely with Anita Durst and Chashama, and produced participatory performances that turn audiences into co-authors.

Her work is held by the White House, NASA, Elon Musk, Anita Durst, and Dennis Overbye, as well as by public and private collections worldwide.

Mirena began making installations as an architecture student in Sofia, where she and fellow architecture students floated a giant balloon work over Ariana Lake. After designing theatrical sets, she received a full scholarship and research assistantship to attend the University of Cincinnati School of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning. There she worked as a 3D artist at the CERHAS lab, developing 3D reconstructions of earthworks in the Ohio River Valley. She began creating 3D work for commercial clients and started a thesis on Cyber Architecture. In 2000 she moved to Silicon Valley to work on Video Games, and in 2010 she moved to New York City to develop participatory, and hands-on works.

Recent focus includes Mars paintings and ink Mars landscapes. She lives and works in New York City, Sofia and Veliko Tarnovo, Bulgaria.