[spectre] New DVD: OPEN SCORE by ROBERT RAUSCHENBERG

[Joel S Bachar]

Experiments in Art and Technology (E.A.T.)

ARTPIX

Microcinema International
announce the pre-release of

 
OPEN SCORE by ROBERT RAUSCHENBERG
9 Evenings: Theatre & Engineering 

 
AVAILABLE NOW - RETAIL - EDUCATIONAL

 

The first in a 10 DVD set of films on a legendary series of theater, dance,
music and performances at the New York 69th Regiment Armory in 1966 by 10
New York artists:  Robert Rauschenberg, John Cage, David Tudor, Yvonne
Rainer, Deborah Hay, Robert Whitman, Steve Paxton, Alex Hay, Lucinda
Childs and Öyvind Fahlström.


Pre-release copies are available ONLY at
http://www.microcinemadvd.com

 General release:  May 29, 2007
----------------------------------------
In 1966 10 New York artists worked with 30 engineers and scientists from the
world renowned Bell Telephone Laboratories to create groundbreaking
performances that incorporated new technology. Video projection, wireless
sound transmission, and Doppler sonar - technologies that are commonplace
today - had never been seen in the art of the 60's. The 9

Evenings DVD Series is an important documentation of the collaborations
between the artists and engineers that produced innovative works using these
emerging technologies. These performances still resonate today, as
forerunners of  the close and rapidly-evolving relationship between artists
and technology.

 The DVDs - one on each artist’s performance -- will be released
sequentially  over the next two years with the initial publication of the
series: 

 Robert Rauschenberg - Open Score, available as a pre-release now on the
Microcinemadvd.com website and with general release May 29,  2007,  followed
by the second in the series:

John Cage - Variations VII,  available in Summer  2007.

Each DVD will be PAL and NTSC system compatible.
 

9 Evenings: Theatre & Engineering is recognized as a major artistic event of
the 1960s. The Performances represented the culmination of a period of
extraordinary creative energy in art, dance and music in the late 1950s and
early 1960s, and they also pointed to the future, as artists began to use
new technology in their work.  

9 Evenings was organized by Robert Rauschenberg and Billy Klüver, then a
research scientist at Bell Laboratories in Murray Hill, New Jersey. It was
held at the 69th Regiment Armory in New York City from October 13-23, 1966.


As Billy Klüver has written: 
"9 Evenings was unique in the incredible richness and imagination of the
performances.  The Armory space allowed the artists to work on an
unprecedented scale, and their involvement with technology and
collaborations with the engineers added a dimension of unfamiliarity and
challenge. They responded with major works."

9 Evenings was the first large-scale collaboration between artists and
engineers and scientists. The two groups worked together for 10 months to
develop technical equipment and systems that were used as an integral part
of the artists? performances. Their collaboration produced  many "firsts" in
the use of new technology for the theater, both with specially-designed
systems and equipment and with innovative use of existing equipment.

Closed-circuit television and television projection was used on stage for
the first time; a fiber-optics camera picked up objects in a performer's
pocket; an infrared television camera captured action in total darkness; a
Doppler sonar device  translated movement into sound; and portable wireless
FM transmitters and amplifiers transmitted speech and body sounds to Armory
loudspeakers.

Using archival film footage and original sound recordings, the 9 Evenings
films reconstruct each artist's performance as fully as possible; they also
contain new interviews with artists, engineers and performers to illuminate
the artistic, technical and historical aspects of the works. 

Performances are by nature ephemeral events; this DVD series assures that
the 9 Evenings  will not be lost but will be available to new generations of

dance and theater students as well as art scholars, artists and the general
public who will have a concrete representation of what 9 Evenings looked
like and how it came to play such an important role in American 20th century
art.

The films on 9 Evenings are produced for E.A.T.  by Julie Martin and
directed by Barbro Schultz Lundestam. They are funded in part by generous
gifts from Robert Rauschenberg and the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation as
well as with support from the Daniel Langlois Foundation for Art Science and
Technology.

The 10 disc  DVD series, 9 Evenings: Theatre & Engineering, is co-produced
by E.A.T. and ARTPIX and will be distributed worldwide by Microcinema
International.

 www.microcinemadvd.com

E.A.T. is a service organization that promotes the collaboration between
artists and engineers to provide artists with access to new technology 
and to facilitate their participation in projects dealing with areas of
social concern.   
 
ARTPIX is a non profit organization that produces DVDs about the arts
including:  Robert Whitman: Performances from the 60s; Trisha Brown:
Early Works 1966-1979; William Wegman: Video Works 1970
1999.(www.artpix.org)
 

For more info on 9 Evenings -
www.9evenings.org