MAeX Art Blog

MAP magazine

I see Omar Sommereyns around town pretty often and, Saturday night he asked me if I had the latest copy of MAP. No, I didn't. MAP is using the lot next to Snitzer Gallery to pick up copies and sample café cubano with temporary seating and a nice crowd. Omar has ventured into a number of projects and, I do support his efforts. So should you.

MAP magazine:

"Finally, a local magazine that does it right. This is the 4th (quarterly) issue of Map magazine, and the quality has been consistently great, so I’m finally letting myself get attached. Splitting the difference between local and non-local content — this issue’s cover, of the Ravonettes, is the first non-local — the magazine focuses on art, music, and culture.

Read the full article at NEW MAeX Artblog view it there. Don't forget to update your bookmarks and backtracks!

Open Source Movement

Open Source Movement:

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At 89 years old, American dancer and choreographer Merce Cunningham has pushed many boundaries in his celebrated career. Long associated with the avant-garde, he has invited numerous collaborations with new media artists over the years. Since 1991, he has used software to choreograph his works, and the resulting sensor-based animations have recently been exhibited as works in their own right. Now the artist is moving his practice towards an open source direction. Longtime Cunningham collaborators Marc Downie, Paul Kaiser, and Shelley Eshkar, who together form the OpenEnded Group, are releasing an open source recording of Cunningham performing a new version of his renowned piece, Loops. Loops was originally performed in 1971 as a solo dance. In this special re-configuration, Cunningham focuses only on his sensor-laden hands and the resulting work is a graceful visualization of his fingers moving through space. The transition into this form indeed visualizes how the artist has evolved over the years. Cunningham is also releasing the score under a Creative Commons (non-commercial/attribution/share-alike) license, so that it can be more closely studied and remixed in the future. For an artist with such a long-standing interest in chance operations, it's a bold and exciting move to see his work opened up to others in this way. - Marisa Olson

Image: Merce Cunningham, Loops, 2008

http://www.openendedgroup.com/index.php/in-progress/loops-open-source/

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(Via Rhizome News.)

Carnival Center Gets Large Donation, New Name

Carnival Center Gets Large Donation, New Name:

"UPDATE: What is $30 million worth? The Carnival Center for the Performing Arts will soon be named after a Miami philanthropist who helped the center get its financial footing with a large donation."

(Via Local10.com - Local News.)

Arts & Letters Daily (30 Dec 2007)

Arts & Letters Daily (30 Dec 2007):

"Giving to charity can induce an endorphin high not unlike sensations people get from drugs such as morphine or heroin... "more

"If you want to know how humans learned to create pleasure by building beautiful things, just look at the birds and the bees... "more

"Yes, classical music really is addressed to people with certain independence of mind, individuals with a capacity to think, to sense, to imagine... "more

(Via Arts & Letters Daily - ideas, criticism, debate.)

I Can Feel It

What we miss by not having public transportation, sweet music and interpersonal relationships on the fly.

Architecture shapes experience at Carnival Center

I admit to not having attended a performance there. I also admit saying I thought there would be problems getting the place filled and produce enough income for such a large facility. Now, Beth Dunlop says just that, along with a few other things.

Architecture shapes experience at Carnival Center:

"The Carnival Center took its own summer vacation from the news-appraisal limelight. But as Miami's performing arts complex launches its second season, the public eye is on it again. The center -- designed by the Argentina-born Cesar Pelli (his New Haven, Conn., firm is now called Pelli Clarke Pelli) -- opened a year ago with all the requisite fanfare. Then reality set in."

(Via MiamiHerald.com: Visual Arts.)

24:33

24:33:

To mark the occasion of what would be John Cage's 95th birthday, WNYC has put together an amazing collection of audio and video from their archives. Video of seminal performances, interviews with the artist, as well as a few oddities including his appearance on the 1960s show 'I’ve Got a Secret' are posted along with writings by the composer. Cage collaborators including Joan LaBarbara, Meredith Monk, and Merce Cunningham also share their stories and insights into Cage as both a collaborator and friend. The festival airs on WNYC2 from September 5th at 12PM until 12:33PM September 6th, with video, audio, and textual documents available on their website. - Caitlin Jones

http://www.wnyc.org/music/johncage.html

(Via Rhizome News.)

Enough with the Math and Science skills thing

Can't we not put the false rhetoric of math and science education to rest once in a while? Jeeeze. Let kids learn to play musical instruments for its own beauty and joy. If all the politicians really believed in education they way they claim, they would keep pulling money away from it. Back to the issue at hand however, music, fiction & poetry, and visual art are all vaild in and of themselves. Think of this world without any of those things. Isn't that reason enough to keep them and support them for what they are?

Arts & Letters Daily (03 Sep 2007):

A Gallup poll found that 80% of Americans think that learning a musical instrument will improve kid's math and science skills. Okay, they're wrong. Still... more

(Via Arts & Letters Daily - ideas, criticism, debate.)

Max Roach

Link: Down Beat Magazine.

Max Roach Dies at 83 Daily News Headlines

Posted 8/16/2007

Max Roach, whose pioneering bebop drumming was revered for its tenacity and musicality, died Wednesday night in his sleep. He was 83.

Roach is considered one of the most important and influential jazz drummers of all time. His work with Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker first thrust him into the jazz spotlight during the mid-'40s. At this time, Roach drew on the style of Kenny Clarke to advance new approaches to drumming, including the use of the bass drum as a comping instrument and a more melodic style of soloing.

Roach recorded with Miles Davis for his groundbreaking Birth Of The Cool sessions, and later he and trumpeter Clifford Brown led an influential hard-bop quintet. Beginning in the '60s, Roach pursued a range of more avant-garde and eclectic projects, performing with such artists as Cecil Taylor and Anthony Braxton.

Roach garnered numerous awards throughout his robust career, including an induction into the DownBeat Hall of Fame in 1980 and a MacArthur "genius grant" in 1981. He also joined the faculty at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in 1972.

In recent years, Roach had become less active due to hydrocephalus-related complications. He was living in New York at the time of his death. DownBeat will report more details of Roach's passing as they become available.

ArtCast: open call for sound art

ArtCast: open call for sound art: "

ArtCast: open call for sound art

folly, a leading digital arts organisation working in Lancashire, Cumbria and online, is developing ArtCast, an ongoing series of podcasting programmes at www.folly.co.uk, as a platform for public access to new and innovative sound art.

Building on the success of OWN [SOUND] ART (2007) at www.folly.co.uk/soundnetwork, a series of podcasts specially commissioned in partnership with SoundNetwork, folly intends to deliver a quarterly series of podcasts exploring the possibilities of the medium, and will launch the first in this series as part of VELOCITY, folly's second Festival of Digital Culture:

VELOCITY Festival of Digital Culture - See the Bay differently
12th October - 3rd November 2007

VELOCITY is ground-breaking new arts festival where you can explore digital art in the sublime context of the coastal rail route between Lancaster and Barrow-in-Furness. Presented in and around train stations, online and for download at www.folly.co.uk

VELOCITY is folly's second annual Festival of Digital Culture and builds on the success of the f.city festival held in Lancaster city centre in 2006 which resulted in over 55,000 people engaging with new media art practice.

VELOCITY will open up new ways of seeing life around Morecambe Bay, engaging with the vibrant communities that line the coast and furthering the role that the arts has in sustaining the spectacular landscape of the South Lakes and North Lancashire.

VELOCITY... celebrating the role of creative technology in connecting people to places.

folly is calling for open submissions of existing audio work, from the broad spectrum of contemporary sound art practice. Submissions should address themes and subjects broadly relating to the ethos of VELOCITY, including but not limited to: travel, movement, landscape, engagement with communities, rural sustainability.

VELOCITY will take place on and around the rail route from Lancaster to Barrow-in-Furness in the North West of England, so folly is looking for podcastable content which can be downloaded and experienced on journeys through and around this area. As part of the festival, folly is also keen to broadcast selected works via the loud speaker systems at stations along the rail route.

Submissions are welcome from all artists working with sound, experimental musicians and composers, writers and performance artists etc, basically anyone who has created work which they consider to be suitable for an audio podcast.

folly welcome submissions from international artists

The deadline for submissions is 14th September 2007

Sonic Arts Network, www.sonicartsnetwork.org, will join folly in the selection of works in late September 2007

Successful submissions will be published as podcasts from 1st October 2007

Please note that there is no fee available for selected works

For more information contact Jennifer Stoddart, folly Programme Coordinator on jennifer.stoddart@folly.co.uk or +44 (0)1524 388550

How to submit:
Files should be mp3s, no larger than 32MB. Submissions should be accompanied by a submission form and equal opportunities monitoring form, obtainable from jennifer.stoddart@folly.co.uk or phone +44 (0) 1524 388550

Please send your submissions by email to jennifer.stoddart@folly.co.uk
Or on CD by post to Jennifer Stoddart, Programme Coordinator
folly, 6.4.4 Alston House
White Cross
Lancaster UK
LA1 4XQ

folly is committed to Equal Opportunities in our employment, programme and services

"

(Via Rhizome.org Opportunities.)