[spectre] OptoSonic Tea @ Diapason NYC - Monday, May 17th, 8pm

[Katherine Liberovskaya]

Monday May 17th
8 pm
 
OptoSonic Tea
 
Live sets by:
 
- Nisi Jacobs (live visuals) with Michael J. Schumacher, Suzanne Thorpe,
Philip White (live sound)
- Adam Kendall (live visuals and live sound)
 
Invited respondent/moderator:
 
- Charlie Morrow
 
Suggested donation:
$ 7
 
Diapason
882 Third Avenue, between 32nd and 33rd Streets, 10th floor
BROOKLYN (Sunset Park)
(718) 499-5070
directions: D, N or R train to 36th Street in Brooklyn
 
 
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
 
OptoSonic Tea is partly funded by the Experimental Television Center.
The Experimental Television Center¹s Presentation Funds program is supported
by the New York State Council on the Arts.

 
About the artists:
 
Nisi Jacobs
Nisi Jacobs creates multichannel video performance and installations. Her
work has been exhibited in festivals at the Jeu De Paume Museum in Paris,
Tribeca Film Festival, Hong Kong Film Festival, Circulo de Bellas Artes of
Madrid, Maya Stendhal Gallery, SONAR festival at the Caracas Contemporary
Art Museum, CalArts Film/Video Cinematheque, The Alejandro Otero Museum,
National Cinématheque of Spain, Manchester Metropolitan University of
England, River-to-River film festival, Ear to the Earth Festival; a CD
release entitled 'Weaves', distributed by En¹tract includes video by Nisi
Jacobs released 2009. Upcoming performances include ŒSynchroma ­
Sonichrome¹, a score realized for bass/laptop/av at the VCW Performance,
ŒR.G.B.A.¹, a collaboration between DRAW/Sarah Bernstein/Stuart Popejoy at
Brooklyn Arts Council, Dumbo 1st Thursday, a collaboration between DRAW and
Philip White/Suzanne Thorpe of 'thenumber46' at Optosonic Tea, and a new
DRAW installation in June at Diapason Gallery. Jacobs has curated
multichannel video programs for Phatory Gallery, HOWL Film Festival, and
SYNCH FESTIVAL of electronic art in Athens, Greece, and currently co-curates
at Diapason Gallery where she has helped launch a new video scoring
workshop, VCW, led and produced by Adam Kendall focusing on the development
of performative video scoring systems. www.drawtoy.com
 
Michael J. Schumacher
Michael J. Schumacher¹s sound installations have been heard at Art in
General, Apex Art, PS 1, The Kitchen and Sculpture Center in New York City,
CCNOA in Brussels, Singuhr Gallery and Tesla in Berlin, the Museum for
Applied Arts in Frankfurt , the Museum of Contemporary Art in Lyon, Triskel
Arts Center in Cork, Ireland, Transmissions Festival in Chicago, Tone Deaf
in Kingston, Ontario, The Sound Art Museum in Rome, )toon Festival in
Haarlem, RADAR in Mexico City, Ostrava Music Days and others. XI Records has
published a DVD set of five sound installations as computer applications,
playable on up to eight speakers, which may be installed on a computer to
create sound environments in the home. Schumacher¹s composition ³Grid², a
computer generated score that unfolds in real time, has been in exhibitions
in New York, Barcelona and Houston. He is currently creating a large scale
continuous sound environment for the lobby of EMPAC in Troy, NY.
In August 2007 Schumacher and Nisi Jacobs began DRAW, an audio-video
performance group. Joined by Tom Chiu, Alex Waterman, Bruce Andrews and
others, they create immersive live sets based on collaborative compositions.
DRAW¹s website is http://drawnyc.com <http://drawnyc.com> .
www.michaeljschumacher.com <http://www.michaeljschumacher.com>
 
Suzanne Thorpe
Suzanne Thorpe is a composer, performer, arts activist and educator.  With
her work, Thorpe explores coexisting perspectives, peripheral consciousness,
and concurrent realities. Her recent compositions are multi-channel works
that employ psychoacoustic phenomena and tuned filtering systems.  They have
been featured at Issue Project Room (NYC), Diapason (NYC), The Stone (NYC),
Activating the Medium Festival (San Francisco), No Idea Festival (Austin,
TX), Redux Contemporary Art Studios (Charleston, SC), Pyramid Atlantic
Center for the Arts (Silver Spring, MD), and other venues. As an improviser
she has performed with Chris Brown, Annette Krebs, Maggie Nicols, Bhob
Rainey, Pauline Oliveros, Gino Robair, Zeena Parkins, Ulrich Krieger, David
Dove, Chris Cogburn, and Bonnie Jones among others. She has been awarded
support for her work from Meet the Composer and NYFA, and has a discography
of over 20 recordings released on Sony, V2, Beggars Banquet, Geffen,
Specific Recordings and Tape Drift. Thorpe is a founding member of the
alternative group Mercury Rev, with whom she worked from 1989 ­ 2001,
earning numerous critical accolades, and a gold record for 1998's Deserters'
Songs. From time to time, she can be heard with J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr., or
with the Wounded Knees. Currently she is touring with feedback artist Philip
White as the duo thenumber46 in support of their newly released recording
Bleach & Ammonia. www.suzannethorpe.com <http://www.suzannethorpe.com>
 
Philip White
Philip White¹s performances center on a non-linear feedback system, which
consists of a mixer and several homemade circuits. In addition to his work
with analog and digital electronics, White has written extensively for
chamber ensembles and created a large body of intermedia pieces that explore
meaning in information transmission. He currently performs with Suzanne
Thorpe (thenumber46) and Chuck Johnson (with chuck johnson with philip
white). Recent and upcoming performances/exhibitions include Diapason (NYC),
The Frying Pan (NYC), The Stone (NYC), Sonic Circuits (DC), Redux New Media
Festival (Charleston, SC), Galerie Neurotitan (Berlin), Youngblood Gallery
(Atlanta), the Red Room (Baltimore), Toy Room Gallery (Sacramento), 701CCA
Gallery (Columbia, SC), Stu-stu-studio(Richmond, VA), Princeton University,
Bent Festival 2010, NYCEMF 2010 and a featured spot on free103.9.org.
thenumber46¹s debut Bleach and Ammonia was recently released in cassette
format on Tape Drift Records. Philip also writes about music, contributing
to the Wire magazine, SEAMUS Journal, and Notes. In 2008, Philip received
his MFA in Electronic and Recorded Media from Mills College where he worked
with Chris Brown, Hilda Parades, Helmut Lachenmann, Roscoe Mitchell and
James Fei. While there he taught both Sound Art and Electronic Arts.
www.prwhite.net <http://www.prwhite.net>
 
Adam Kendall
Adam Kendall is a videoist and musician living and working in Brooklyn, NY.
He treats video as dynamically and improvisationally as traditional
performance arts and as a medium capable of detailed, structured
composition. Adam regularly performs and screens pieces both solo and in
various collaborations, organizes the a/v performance series {R}ake, and
runs the Video Composition Workshop. He is a software developer and
incorporates his own programming in his performances and pieces.
http://www.hellbender.org <http://www.hellbender.org/>
 
Charlie Morrow
Charlie Morrow (1942 USA) is a composer, sound artist and producer whose
work spans many styles and genres. He is based in Barton VT and Helsinki FI.
In the 60s: Soundscapes for ³The Knoll Furniture Show² at Le Louvre, a sound
portrait of Marilyn Monroe at Sidney Janus Gallery, the score and sound
design for Frances Thompson Films ³Moon Walk One² and arrangements for The
Rascals and Vanilla Fudge. In the 70s: explorations of the New/Old, outside
the concert hall with shamanic chants, ³A Healing Piece² play for
Performance Group now Wooster Group, Concert for Fish on Little Neck Bay,
with poet Jerome Rothenberg the New Wilderness Foundation concerts,
broadcasts, recordings and publications, collaborations with Fluxus artists
including Corner, Higgins, Knowles, Hendricks. International Solstice event
broadcasts with Wave Music series 40 Cellos, 30 Harps, 100 Musicians w
lights, 60 Clarinets and a boat. In the 80s: Toot N Blink Chicago for two
fleets of boats with radio DJ commands, Copenhagen Waves for all Copenhagen.
Improvising on pocket trumpet and shell horns with Derek Bailey, Don Cherry.
Co-Founded the Ocarina Orchestra, Grand Conch Chorus. A Light Opera at La
Mama with Min Tanaka dancers and Western Wind vocal ensemble. In the 90s: 64
channel sound installation for Hall of Planet Earth American Museum of
Natural History, international radio Circumpolar Greeting Arctic Spring,
sound/music for art interactive Scrutiny in the Great Round, Tokyo New York
Copenhagen 3 City Dance via video conference. In the 00s: True 3D sound and
WIndsails electronic and landscape works and installations.
 
  
for more information about OptoSonic Tea please visit:
http://www.diapasongallery.org/optosonic.html