Tati Bruening, also known as Illumitati, spent her childhood in a lot of ‘liminal spaces’. Born in Frankfurt, Germany, and raised in Orange County, California, the 24-year-old’s parents were both professional basketball players, so she’d kill time in the youth room while they were coaching teams at her local church or after hours in the teacher’s lounge. “All the lights would be off, and I would just be in the copy room playing with paper or trying to discover new parts of the school,” she says. “I experienced a lot of boredom as a child and also didn’t get a mobile device until I was 14.” 

Once Bruening was online, she (similarly) spent a lot of time on ‘third spaces’ on the web. The scenes in her work depict the eerie feeling of being somewhere in-between: around strange corners, hallways and back rooms. Blurring the line between physical and digital, and analogue and modern, Bruening plays around with the optimistic technological future that was promised in her childhood – a time on the internet, while she was still growing up, that felt exciting and still entirely human. “The internet is my slop kingdom,” she says. “I need one area of my life where it’s just absolutely stupid.”

Bruening is building a world of her own, social media post at a time. She recently partnered with Lenovo and Intel’s Make Space platform, an initiative that encourages creatives to explore emerging technologies. This month, the programme introduced the Make Space Network, an AI-assisted tool designed to spark new creative connections.

Ahead of the launch, we spoke to Bruening about growing up in parallel to the internet, her ‘absurdist arc’, Illuminati memes, liminal spaces and building out her world collaboratively, with Lenovo and Intel.

How would you describe your creative practice?

Tati Bruening: I would say that it’s organised chaos. Everything is in the Google Calendar, but the Google Calendar looks like a pride flag. There’s a vibe where there’s a million things happening at once at all times, but all working towards something bigger than myself. 

I know you work across mediums. What are the ones you are most drawn to?

Tati Bruening: I’ve worked with every single medium at this point. As an artist, it’s not so much about focusing on a medium as it is about building a world. I try to approach art from a more Renaissance perspective, where an artist can be across so many different sorts of mediums, but still portray the same message and still have that world-building element within whatever it might be.

What are some of your earliest memories of creating art?

Tati Bruening: I always had a tough relationship with art because I grew up in my pretty conservative hometown, where it was frowned upon to pursue anything in the arts. It would be perceived as not a good career path, so I didn’t really focus on art much growing up. It felt like a secret boyfriend that I had that my parents and society didn’t really approve of. But I would say my earliest memory would honestly just be making doodles in kindergarten. I won an art competition and knew it was something that I do well, but it was always just a matter of risk-taking. 

Is there a story behind the name ‘Illumitati’?

Tati Bruening: When I was 12, I was with one of my sister’s high school teammates. It was back during the time when everyone had a very serious Instagram name, but a very silly Finsta or Twitter handle. Out of the blue, somebody was like, ‘You should name it Illumitati’. So then ‘Illuminati’ was my Finsta name for the longest time, until it became the handle for my main account. I enjoy it because it’s very silly, but it captures a deep-rooted conspiracy and a whole era of meme culture around the Illuminati. It’s actually quite fitting. 

What’s the intention behind your work? And how has it changed over the years?

Tati Bruening: It’s always changing. As I grow as a person and as new experiences come my way, I think I would be a fool as an artist to stick to one thesis for the entirety of my career. There are different ‘eras’ I’ve been in: I used to be all about contrast and traditional sorts of photography, like fashion photography, and I’ve shifted more into creating absurdist works on the inbetweens and liminal spaces. Absurdism is a massive theme in everything I do, as well as some sort of social commentary wrapped up in a palatable form.

Is that your era right now, then? Absurdism?

Tati Bruening: I’m definitely in my most absurdist arc. There’s something to be said about making works that can make somebody feel uncomfortable, but also like they can't look away from it for some reason. It’s this weird line between feeling warmth, comfort and nostalgia, but also very uneasy.

And your work is full of nostalgic, more analogue depictions of technology. What interests you specifically in the contrast between old and new digital worlds?

Tati Bruening: It’s interesting to display older forms of technology in a modern way, or vice versa. There was this optimistic future of technology promised to Gen Z as children, and now we’ve come to an age where that future never came to fruition. I feel like a lot of my work is a commentary on what it could be, instead of how it actually is: the reality of what the era has devolved into and how technology has failed us by not providing this very human-like experience. 

What are some of your earliest memories of the internet? Did it feel hopeful?

Tati Bruening: Yes, I think the Y2K era of the internet was this really cool wild west. It felt like a new frontier in a sense. And to be able to grow up pretty much in parallel to the growth of the internet, where we both went through our angsty teen years of YouTube in the 2010s at the same time, was a very interesting experience. 

There’s something to be said about making works that can make somebody feel uncomfortable, but also like they can't look away from it for some reason. It’s this weird line between feeling warmth, comfort and nostalgia, but also very uneasy

Your work often depicts how the body exists online. Why do you use self-portraiture as a vehicle for those conversations?

Tati Bruening: My ideas are so outlandish, and some of these works are very intimate depictions, so it’s easier to be able to do it on your own than to try and direct another person and convince them to paint themselves in silver and jump into a lake. It’s just something most people aren’t willing to do. And there’s nobody as committed to the bit as myself. 

What’s the weirdest ritual you have around your work?

Tati Bruening: I was talking the other day about how I always try to come up with the worst idea first. So that’s a ritual that I do. Oftentimes, they are so bizarre, controversial or stupid that even saying it is the silliest way to start and sets the precedent for, ‘Okay, it can’t get worse than this’. 

How do you use AI in your work?

Tati Bruening: I spoke about organised chaos, and I use AI for the organisation. There are so many different avenues and projects that I'm working on at once, so I use it as a tool for organisation. It’s a personal assistant that I can turn to and be an external hard drive for the information overload that I can’t keep in my own brain.

How do you think AI could be used for creative collaboration?

Tati Bruening: I think it’s a tool to use to better communicate with people. It’s good for creating mockups and initial communication. I collaborate with a lot of people around the world, whether they’re in Latvia, Germany, Lithuania or in a country where there is some form of language barrier. I think that it's really good to be able to have a better way of communicating with one another. 

I know you spoke about the unfulfilled promised future of technology. But what excites you about the future of new and evolving AI technology?

Tati Bruening: I think what’s exciting about it is being able to have a very streamlined way of creation where there are fewer barriers around your physical skillset to be able to execute the ideas. As AI continues to grow, there are ways of integrating AI into work that are really exciting. Everyone always thinks of generating imagery, but I think there’s something else there that we have yet to discover, that’s a more creative purpose surrounding AI – using AI to create systems that make works with better commentary, as opposed to using AI to make the work itself.

Your work itself sounds actually quite manual also. Are there any no-gos for you when it comes to AI?

Tati Bruening: I think to take away that human element of creation is my hard line. I think there are intangible things and small miracles that only humans can perform. In a very Bob Ross way, you’ll never have a happy accident with AI, and not killing your humanity completely is very important. Although making something sterile and devoid in itself is commentary, using it with great power comes great responsibility. 

Do you use your Lenovo Yoga Aura Edition more for sketching or storytelling?

Tati Bruening: I’m definitely more sketching on it. That way, I’m getting the bones of my project together before the execution.

What piece of work are you most proud of and why?

Tati Bruening: Something that I'm really proud of is the series that I did called TVPG, which was all these nostalgia-based video art pieces that were kind of reminiscent of Adult Swim bumpers, but presenting kind of dismal topics in a sense, and corporate slavery. But ultimately, it’s all about whatever my next idea is, to be honest. I make something and then put it aside, so it’s a little bit hard for me to look back. 

Where’s your head at right now, then?

Tati Bruening: I really want to get more into live performance art. So I’m planning a couple of performance art pieces that I really want to execute, as well as sculptures and live presentations.

What are the rules you intentionally break?

Tati Bruening: I think there’s a perception that you can’t have a sense of humour in your art, that you have to be a very serious artist all the time. I try not to take myself too seriously and also use my work as more of a practice than finish work. I can very confidently say that there’s never a time that I’m putting something out on the internet where I feel like it’s a fully completed work. Most of my work is essentially just demonstrations or practices, and I don't want to perceive it as my magnum opus or put too much pressure on the idea that something needs to be perfect all the time.

That feels like an uncommon approach to posting online right now. 

Tati Bruening: Everyone’s trying to have aura and be very esoteric at all times. But I think you’re limiting yourself if you are not creating an almost stream of conscious with the internet. I also don’t think anyone in Gen Z, with the exception of a handful of people, has earned the right to be that elusive on the internet. 

What are your 2026 resolutions, artistic or otherwise?

Tati Bruening: Balance. I’m building out a team and learning more about international talent that operates on a more team-based level as opposed to having this individualistic approach to art. I want to build out a world with people beyond myself.

Explore Lenovo devices built for creative experimentation by heading here – all devices are powered by the latest Intel Core Ultra processor.