This post was updated Aug. 4 at 8:22 p.m.

UCLA alumni are proving that even in the digital age, art can be sublime.

At Los Angeles’ Fellows of Contemporary Art, the summer exhibition “Hyperobject: Art in the Age of YOLO*” is featuring the work of seven artists born between 1991 and 2003 through Aug. 17. The lives of this cohort of Millennial and Generation Z creators – which includes alumni Mae Noland and Violet Treadwell Hull – have been intertwined with the internet since birth. The exhibit’s curator, Emma Diffley, said the idea for the collection originated with an untitled piece by Peña Espinoza Peña that referenced Immanuel Kant’s theory of the sublime.

“When I went and did further research on the sublime, and I was thinking about all of the artists in this exhibition, the underlying connection between everyone was there was an internet or digital influence,” Diffley said.

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This digital influence carried over into the visual representations of the collection, Diffley said. Contrary to possible expectations, Diffley said there is only one piece of digital artwork in the show, while the others apply the artists’ experiences with technology to the canvas through traditional painting techniques. Likewise, the incorporation of the acronym “YOLO” – shorthand for “you only live once” – into the series’ title was purposeful, since it is linked to the concept of mortality and the inevitability of death that echoes the perspective of the sublime, she added.

Diffley said she first met Noland and Treadwell Hull at a UCLA Open Studios event last year, where the pieces she later selected for inclusion in “Hyperobject: Art in the Age of YOLO*” were already on display. She said she was drawn to the pair’s artworks because of their use of the color green and Treadwell Hull’s nod to the “YOLO generation” in their artist statement. From there, it was a logical choice to include these artists in the show, Diffley said.

Noland’s contribution to the collection is her painting “Truth Coming Out of Her Well to Shame Mankind (Harry Styles),” a 78-by-66 inch piece that recreates a nude photograph of Harry Styles from 2015. She said she first encountered the image that inspired the painting as a 13-year-old when it was sent in an eighth grade group chat, but the memory remained burned in her mind when creating the painting. Combining the image of Styles with the 1896 piece “Truth Coming Out of Her Well” was a natural decision, she added.

To make the painting, Noland said she focused upon the graininess and fuzziness of the original image, which directed her approach to depicting light. Over the course of two to three weeks, Noland said she toyed with the original image’s pixelation and overexposure to create a sense of reflectiveness and bouncing light on the canvas. The final product is imperfect, but successfully brought her vision of conveying both seriousness and humor to life, she said.

“I love it when I can make something that’s kind of beautiful but also just genuinely goofy,” Noland said.

Two of Treadwell Hull’s pieces feature in the exhibition, both of which are self-portraits. One is a 32-by-48 inch oil painting called “The More I See the More I Stand Alone (Example of Magic),” which Treadwell Hull said replicates an image of them as a schoolchild with orange extensions in their hair. They said they prefer to create self-portraits, not out of vanity, but because of the heavy responsibility that comes with portraying others and the self-awareness brought by looking inward.

“I find that I feel really unresolved about most of the things that have happened in the past, like I don’t always know how to make sense of them,” Treadwell Hull said. “But it feels like when I’m painting, I can often find some type of clarity about what still is kicking around in my mind.”

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Treadwell Hull’s other piece in the exhibition is “Cardinal,” an 84 ⅜ inch by 36 inch painting overlaid with lyrics from Buzzcocks’ 1979 song “Why Can’t I Touch It?” The dramatic length of the painting encourages viewers’ eyes to scan back and forth across the canvas as if they were watching a tennis match, Treadwell Hull said. The choice to include song lyrics was a response to the interwoven nature of music with film and the internet, they said, because of the way an audio accompaniment can shift the onlooker’s perception.

Diffley said she hopes visitors to the exhibit will be able to learn from the art being showcased, even if they are unfamiliar with the concept of the sublime. Viewers of “Hyperobject: Art in the Age of YOLO*” will be able to experience the past while seeing firsthand the sublime’s impact on the contemporary artistic styles of the future, she added.

“I love the art historical connections and thinking of the question ‘Would this work have been possible 100 years ago?’” Diffley said. “I really don’t think so.”