[spectre] OptoSonic Tea - NYC: Friday May 30th @ EI

[Katherine Liberovskaya]

Friday May 30th, 9pm

OptoSonic Tea

Live sets by:
- Pamela Z
- Daniel Vatsky and Chris Jordan (video) and John Cohrs (audio)

Invited respondent/moderator:
- Miya Masaoka

Suggested donation: 
$ 7

Experimental Intermedia 
224 Centre Street at Grand, Third Floor, NY 10013  
212 431 5127, 212 431 6430

OptoSonic Tea is a regular series of meetings dedicated to the convergence
of live visuals with live sound which focuses on the visual component. These
presentation-and-discussion meetings aim to explore different forms of live
visuals (live video, live film, live slide projection and their variations
and combinations) and the different ways they can come into interaction with
live audio. Each evening features two different live visual artists or
groups of artists who each perform a set with the live sound artists of
their choice. The presentations are followed by an informal discussion about
the artists' practices over a cup of green tea. A third artist, from
previous generations of visualists or related fields, is invited
specifically to participate in this  discussion so as to create a dialogue
between current and past practices and provide different perspectives on the
present and the future.

Organized by Katherine Liberovskaya and Ursula Scherrer


About the artists:

Pamela Z is a San Francisco-based composer/performer and audio artist who
works primarily with voice, live electronic processing, and sampling
technology. She creates solo works combining operatic bel canto and
experimental extended vocal techniques with found percussion objects, spoken
word, digital processing, and a MIDI controller called The BodySynthª (which
allows her to manipulate sound with physical gestures.) In addition to her
solo work, she has composed and recorded scores for dance, theatre, film,
and new music chamber ensembles. Her large-scale multi-media works have been
presented at Theater Artaud and ODC in SanFrancisco and at The Kitchen in
New York, and her audio works have been presented in exhibitions at the
Whitney Museum in New York and the Diszesanmuseum in Cologne. Her
multi-media opera Wunderkabinet based on the Museum of Jurassic Technology
(created in collaboration with Matthew Brubeck and Christina McPhee) has
been presented at The LAB Gallery (San Francisco) in 2005 and at REDCAT
(Disney Hall, Los Angeles) in 2006. Pamela Z has toured extensively
throughout the US, Europe, and Japan. She has performed in numerous
festivals including Bang on a Can at Lincoln Center in New York, the
Interlink Festival in Japan, the Other Minds Festival in San Francisco, Pina
Bausch Tanztheater Festival in Wuppertal, Germany, and La Biennale di
Venezia in Italy. She is the recipient of numerous awards including a
Guggenheim Fellowship, the Creative Capital Fund, the CalArts Alpert Award
in the Arts, the ASCAP Music Award, and the NEA and Japan/US Friendship
Commission Fellowship. She holds a music degree from the University of
Colorado at Boulder.
For more information visit www.pamelaz.com <http://www.pamelaz.com>

Daniel Vatsky is a Brooklyn-based intermedia artist and VJ since 2001. He
has created video for multimedia artist Laurie Anderson, comedian Chris
Rock, documentary filmmaker Ric Burns, and serves as the visual coordinator
of The Psychasthenia Society, a multimedia theater group combining realtime
video with live music and storytelling. Recent works include "The Last
Friday", an interactive video game about the Critical Mass bicycle rides in
New York City. His current project - which will be used in this performance
- is a high-definition video mixer built in software.
www.skyvat.net

Chris Jordan explores the medium of light, movement, and time through the
use of technology. His installations have appeared at the Moma, the New
Museum, the Whitney, the Museum of Natural History, Times Square, numerous
galleries and clubs; and the incidental spaces inbetween. The common
elements that define Chris' work include explorations into memory,
photography, film, interactivity, and of course, projections. By examining
the political and social implications technology has on us through a
diversity of media, his work questions and challenges the viewer to redefine
traditional perceptions of audience and performer. In addition Chris teaches
interactive design at Baruch College and NYU; and organizes T-Minus,
G33kXmas, rooftop movies, and visualist salons in New York City.
www.seej.net/create/
www.seej.net/g33kxmas/
www.t-minus.org

Jon Cohrs (splnlss.com) is an artist/recording engineer who runs Spleenless
Mastering in Brooklyn, New York. He used to perform with the now defunct
Portland band, Orange and Allred and now plays in a duo with Australian
composer Rae Howel, called Rabbits without Spleens. Their upcoming record
will be out later this fall. For more info go to rabbitswithoutspleens.com

Miya Masaoka resides in New York City and is a classically trained musician,
composer and sound/installation artist. She has created works for solo koto,
laser interfaces, explosive powders, model trains, laptop and video.  She
has also made works for sculpture installations and notated scores for
ensembles, chamber orchestra and mixed choirs. She has been a guest with the
Berkeley Symphony, Bang on a Can, So Percussion Ensemble, Pharoah Sanders
and the Toshiko Akiyoshi Big Band.
Her work has been performed throughout the world including the Venice
Biennale 2004, the Miller Theater, NYC, Merkin Hall, V2  (Rotterdam), Ircam,
(Paris), KunstRadio (Vienna), Radio Breman (Germany), Yerba Buena Center for
the Arts (San Francisco), Le Centrale (Canada), and festivals including DEAF
(Ireland),  Victoriaville (British Columbia), London Musicians¹ Collective¹s
Festival of Experimental Music (England), Other Minds Festival and Redcat
Theater (USA), and she has toured to India six times with violinist virtuoso
Dr. L. Subramaniam.
Commissions include Engine 27/Harvestworks, Gerbode Foundation, Wattis
Fellowship, British Broadcasting Co. (BBC), Asian Art Foundation, Alonzo
King and Lines Ballet, Kathleen Supove.  Other ensembles performing her work
include Volti, Ensemble of the Piedmont Choirs, San Francisco Choral Society
and Rova Saxophone Quartet.
She has been awarded the prestigious Alpert Arts Award, the ASCAP and The
New Langton Arts Award, NEA and Meet the Composer.  Residencies include
Other Minds, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Headlands Center for the Arts,
Western Front (Vancouver), Jacob¹s Pillow and STEIM (the Netherlands), Other
Minds Residency, and the Asian Cultural Council Japan Fellowship and Bang on
a Can People¹s Commissioning Grant.
She has collaborated and worked with many leading artists including Pauline
Oliveros, Steve Coleman, Cecil Taylor, Fred Frith, Christian Wolff, Henry
Brandt, Andrew Cyrille, Reggie Workman and Vijay Iyer.
Sound installations (group exhibits) include Center for Art and Visual
Culture (University of Maryland), Lincoln Center Out of Doors (Homemade
Instrument Day), the Kitchen (Charles Morrow¹s Cube), 2006 Winter Olympics
(Torino, Italy), The Kitchen;  Graphic Notation in Contemporary Music
(2007).  She is currently on faculty of the Bard College Milton Avery School
of the Arts MFA Program in Music/Sound (since 2003).



for more information about OptoSonic Tea please visit:
http://www.diapasongallery.org/optosonic.html