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Staging Stustainability : April 20-22, 2011 at York University

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Call for Papers

The conference committee invites proposals for papers addressing the relationship between the cultural and environmental aspects of sustainability.

Potential topics and questions might include:

  • performance ecologies
  • green design for performance
  • theatre and eco-activism
  • How can the arts widen our perception of nature and our ability to experience, reflect and adapt to the environment?
  • What is the relationship between aesthetics and ethics in terms of our consideration of the environment?
  • How are cultural values expressed in rituals and public events creating a human ecology?

Proposals should include:

  • a 250-word abstract
  • presenter’s name & affiliation
  • mailing & email addresses

Please forward proposals to:

Ina Agastra, Executive Assistant to the Dean
Faculty of Fine Arts, York University
4700 Keele St. Toronto ON Canada M3J 1P3
 ffadeanasst@yorku.ca

Submission deadline: September 1, 2010

Introduction to Water, CA

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Water, CA grew out of our mutual connection to the Salton Sea.

The largest lake in California, the Salton Sea is bound by a sordid history of unchecked development and foreseeable natural disaster. In the 1920’s, land developers gambled on plots of land surrounding a flash-in-the-desert resort. After two major floods, the landholders could trade their chips only for the bleached bones of tilapia that now cover the neglected sea’s shore. Miles of developed plots, with electrical and plumbing piped in, now sits abandoned. Popularly referred to on the Internet as the only “manmade mistake visible from space, the Salton Sea has become a symbol for the mis-engineering of water on a galactic scale.

However, the remaining residents of Niland, Salton City, and Bombay Beach refuse to give up on their marginal communities. In Chris Metzler and Jeff Springer’s documentary Plagues and Pleasures on the Salton Sea (2006), local holdouts traverse the Colorado Desert shores in golf carts, sharing mid-morning cocktails and fond memories of the great parties of the past. They are articulate about their shared history on the sea. They share a mythology, as well, extolling the healing properties of the salty, wine-colored water. Such awareness of the water that connects them and holds them close is unusual in the West. But then, this sea calls to mavericks.

The Salton Sea also calls to artists. Its sublime, apparitional presence in the middle of a desert at the foot of the stark Chocolate Mountains, anchoring hot,dry borderlands, is the perfect end for the San Andreas Fault. Photographers, painters, and writers describe the abandoned resort structures, outstanding vernacular architecture, and the spectacular sense that here something reveals what is often hidden. History shakes off the palimpsest of progress.

Although its re-creation may have been wildly accidental, the survival of the Salton Sea is vital. Even as the structures on its shores decay in a picturesque soup of salt and rust, the sea serves as a last refuge to many species of birds. It shakily stands in for wetlands now covered with the asphalt of Los Angeles, Orange, and San Diego Counties.

Perhaps it is this familiar state of watershed paradox—infused with apocalyptic splendor, fueled by myth, forged in the violence of dams, and swamped under secret decay—that inspires so many artistic investigations into California’s water.

The projects featured in Water, CA delve into buried histories, uncovering convergences and unexpected connections. They revive dead languages, speaking words in ways that signify forgotten meanings. They meander down unexpected paths, reminding us of the joys of discovery. They are gentle, yet forceful, warning us of the impossibility that became California’s water.

Best described by Marc Reisner in Cadillac Desert, California’s water policies over the last 150 years directly manifest the mythology that made the West. “Clouds follow ploughs, the notion that tilled earth would create moisture, sent American settlers West with magical thinking. Unusually wet weather patterns temporarily supported the theory that the bustle of settlers and the noise of imperialism would create moisture clouds and alter the climate. Dynamite exploding in arid skies to create clouds set the tone of the century. The superhuman irrigation of a “semi-desert with a desert heart” (Reisner) shaped the politics of the world.

As the landscape was reengineered, so was language. One can track the cultural consciousness of water through the shifting vocabulary of the 20th century. “Conservation” once meant exploiting every possible resource for human use. “Waste” was letting water reach the ocean unhindered. “Reclamation” required draining lakes and moving wetlands off the land.

Along with the riparian areas, the watershed citizen has become dislocated. In a 19th century business strategy of supporting private concentrations of power and wealth through land development, water ended up as state property. As citizens, we have lost our connection to where our water comes from, where it goes next, and what is sacrificed along the way. What is at stake is the evaporating illusion of our civilization.

Each of these acts of art resensitize us to our environment, remind us of lost histories, and reenvision our communities. In an age where “green” has become just another corporate branding strategy, artists offer new strategies to affect social change. The collected works of Water, CA inspire us to break from isolation, seek out hidden links, and amplify quiet voices.

In 2010, beyond the hot, pungent beaches strewn with bones and dying birds, the ruins of Salton Sea resorts continue their slow decay. As California faces multiple simultaneous crises, the abandoned gated communities that surround the Sea silently demonstrate the disastrous intersection of economic failure, real-estate collapse, and misunderstanding of local water. Water, CA offers us an opportunity to restore our vision of local ecology, so that we may create a different story for California’s water – a sustainable future.

– Enid Baxter Blader and Nicole Antebi

via Water, CA – Introduction.

NEW LIFE CANCUN Call for Proposals

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Call for Proposals

Artists working with interventions, activism and other participatory practices are invited to apply for participation in NEW LIFE CANCUN. This experimental hospitality project will take place during the UN Climate Change summit (COP 16) in Canc̼n, Mexico from 29 Nov Р10 Dec 2010.

In continuation of Wooloo’s NEW LIFE COPENHAGEN festival – in which we secured housing for more than 3.000 activists coming to the Copenhagen summit – NEW LIFE CANCUN is aiming to connect visiting activists and NGO employees with local families in the area of Cancún, infamous for its vulnerability to climate disasters (mainly hurricanes), as well as for the high-CO2 emissions associated with its tourism sector.

Utilising this meeting of hosts and guests in Cancun as our exhibition platform, artists and activists are invited to explore its social architecture and suggest work proposals of an awareness, educational and/or practical-action nature designed around the topic: “NEW WAYS OF LIVING TOGETHER”.

Up to five artists will be selected for participation and will get all travel, accommodation and production costs covered by Wooloo. Proposals must include a detailed budget. As fundraising efforts are still ongoing, we do not yet know the size of our final production budget. However, it wont be large – so please be aware that your project must be able to be realized in a low-budget manner!

The deadline for work proposals is Thu 1 August 2010.

Please direct all research questions to contact[at]wooloo.org

NEW LIFE is an ongoing series of works focusing on social and artistic experimentation. Staged by Wooloo and taking place in institutions and public spaces worldwide, NEW LIFE aims to be a test field for new ways of living together on our planet.

NEW LIFE CANCUN is a collaboration between Wooloo.org and the Mexican climate change collective Carbonding.

via ==criticalnetwork== NEW LIFE CANCUN.

Back to the Future: The NEA Survey on Arts Participation

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FROM THE GREEN ROOM: Dance/USA’s e-Journal

By Marc Kirschner

The ultimate conclusion of the National Endowment for the Art’s Audience 2.0 survey, that “Arts participation through media appears to encourage – rather than replace – live arts attendance,” is neither a surprise, nor news. It’s not the first study to come to that conclusion, and, in fact, any other outcome would have flown in the face of conventional wisdom. That said, for the NEA to supplement its 2008 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts with an edition focused purely on media is an important first step in changing the dialogue, and putting to rest some basic fears that have impeded real progress in the performing arts.

The NEA survey’s primary function is to serve as a snapshot: here is the state of the art at this particular time. It serves this function well. But it’s not enough, nor does the NEA claim it to be. Whereas the survey provides a valuable data point that can kick-start forward-thinking dialogue, the practical impact of the survey is limited by the rapid rate of innovation that has taken place over the past few years. Since the beginning of the May 2007 survey period:

• Facebook’s user base has grown from 20 million to 400 million users

• The entire book publishing industry has been turned upside down by e-readers, such as the Kindle, Nook and iPad

• Millions of set-top boxes, Blu-ray DVD and home theater PCs have connected televisions to broadband Internet

• Hulu launched its online video service to the public

• More than 300,000 people viewed simulcasts and encores of the Metropolitan Opera’s Carmen

• The first 3-D network began broadcasting

• Four generations of iPhones have been released

Three vital audience behaviors – seeking, browsing, and consuming content and information – have changed dramatically over the past few years and are going to continue to evolve with new technology. The most popular technologies now in wide use are not the latest fads to hit the market – they are in their second, third and fourth generations. New business models have emerged, failed, succeeded, been modified, adapted, discarded and improved in real time over just three years.

There is value to all organizations in being able to recognize how out of date the research contained in this report is.

While some dance companies are still wondering what to do about YouTube and Facebook, and continue to take a “wait and see” attitude toward more intensive and productive uses of technology, other organizations and artists are taking risks and challenging long-held assumptions. The UK’s National Theatre (NT) released a report earlier this month about the impact of satellite cinema broadcasts of Phedre on its audiences. Dance can learn from this survey not because cinema audiences “reported higher levels of emotional engagement” than live audiences, but because the NT has already implemented the findings into its strategic plan.

Which raises another key issue: Once a dance company has actionable information and presumably wants to act, can it?

A general consensus throughout many dance company boards maintains that risk should be avoided, instead of managed. Progressive initiatives are stalled because decision-makers are unfamiliar, don’t understand, condescend toward or don’t even use the new technologies. A few months ago, John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts President Michael Kaiser wrote in The Huffington Post:

“… the biggest problem we face in the arts is a lack of trained arts managers and board members. One can trace the demise of virtually every bankrupt arts organization to a lack of competent staff and/or board leadership.”

Understanding these new technologies has to be included in the definition of organizational competency. Funders need to be a part of the process. They need to share in the risk and mandate progress by funding short-term technology-rich projects capable of returning incremental and current knowledge and experience. Failure should be viewed as being as valuable as success. Instead of funding a few massive multiyear programs where, by the time targets are defined, funds are awarded, data is analyzed and findings are shared, all of the basic assumptions have changed, let’s put future funding resources into smaller, faster, more nimble projects.

Fail. Fail again. Succeed. Build on that success. Move forward.

We can’t wait for long-range studies to tell us that three years ago data showed engagement via electronic media encouraged arts participation. We can’t wait for studies to tell us, three years from now, what is happening today.

Marc Kirschner is the founder and general manager of TenduTV. TenduTV aggregates and distributes dance-related programming through its network of more than 70 digital platforms capable of reaching over half a billion devices in ten countries. He currently serves on the Dance/NYC advisory committee.

via Back to the Future: The NEA Survey on Arts Participation — FROM THE GREEN ROOM: Dance/USA’s e-Journal.

Institute of Contemporary Arts : Talks : The Climate for Theatre

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8 July 2010 –  £5 / £4 ICA Members plus + £1.20 booking fee per ticket in advance

As theatre makers struggle to create the iconic work about climate change, should they borrow the models of local activism practiced by the anti-globalisation movement? Can theatre that inspires change by virtue of its rootedness in real life concerns also connect and inspire on an international stage? Chaired by Chris Smith, previously secretary of State for Culture and now chairman of the Environment Agency, and with speakers including John Jordan, artist and activist and author of We Are Everywhere, this debate examines theatre makers’ attitudes to environmental concerns. Why, unlike AIDS, the conflict between Israel and Palestine or even the global financial crisis, has climate change not inspired a potentially attitude-shifting piece of theatre? Films and literature have tackled the subject through fiction and polemic; where is the theatrical equivalent?

But is there actually a need for a catalyst, a great inspirational moment, or should we just continue at a local level, building from the grassroots up and up? As climate change activists deal with the failure of the Copenhagen talks last year, there is a move away from global mobilisation towards specific and local targets such as particular fossil-fuel power plants or mines, focusing more on local grassroots campaigns, “to start from the bottom” as the Rising Tide spokesman puts it. Should theatre makers take a leaf from the activists’ book and think local? As a subject that touches the daily business of life, is it more appropriate that theatre that addresses climate change and the need for action should itself be created in a local and practical context, intimately connected to its audience or participants’ daily life?

Held in association with Artsadmin, This is the third of four LIFT Debates that form part of LIFT Club at the ICA. These debates aim to explore our new relationship with theatre in the company of international theatre makers, critics and commentators.

Special Offer

Buying a ticket for this event and for the ICA featured LIFT performances at the same time – Revolution Now, Best Before, FML or Oxygen – entitles the purchaser to a discounted ICA Members price on their chosen performance. Call the ICA Box Office for details.

via Institute of Contemporary Arts : Talks : The Climate for Theatre.

BP arts sponsorship: can Tate afford it? | John Sauven, Greenpeace UK | Culture | guardian.co.uk

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More from the Guardian on the relationship of BP to the Tate Modern…

Tate director Nicholas Serota needs to consider this risk carefully. Does his institution want to be associated with one of the world’s biggest single sources of pollution? One that has actively lobbied to undermine clean energy, pouring huge sums into industry groups that campaign to lower carbon taxes and weaken climate legislation? BP’s alternative energy business is a plaything of former boss Lord Browne that has been consigned to the corporate rubbish tip. For these reasons and others, BP is certain to remain the focus of environmental resistance and public anger for years to come. Similarly, those who choose to lend the company an air of acceptability by receiving corporate sponsorship will continue to be seen as legitimate targets for protest around the world. This movement is still in its infancy, but will only gather in strength.

BP arts sponsorship: can Tate afford it? | John Sauven, Greenpeace UK | Culture | guardian.co.uk.

Julie’s Bicycle Helps UK Theatres Cut Carbon

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Reprinted from The Guardian: “Green Dreams: How Can Theatre Cut Its Carbon Emissions?” by Chris Wilkinson, June 29, 2010

As the financial climate gets ever chillier, much has been said about the need for theatre companies to band together if they are to survive the coming cuts. So it is good to see that a new spirit of cooperation is now developing across the industry – albeit in response to an entirely different climate. The curiously named Julie’s Bicycle – an organisation that exists to help the creative industries lower their greenhouse gas emissions – has recently announced the launch of a “UK-wide theatre programme” aimed at helping theatres play their part in the fight against climate change.

Of course, for some theatres, an interest in the environment is nothing new. There have been individual efforts going on for a number of years now. Some companies are building theatres that are literally recycled, the National Theatre has been working with Philips to reduce its energy consumption and east London’s Arcola theatre has made itself the industry leader with its hugely impressive Arcola Energy project.

Yet what is particularly exciting about this new initiative is that it seeks to foster a much greater level of cooperation across the industry as a whole. The aim of Julie’s Bicycle is to bring together producers from both the commercial and subsidised sectors, and they have already attracted some of the biggest names on both sides of the theatrical divide. A steering committee for the project has been set up, chaired by Nick Starr, the executive director of the National Theatre, which boasts representatives from organisations as diverse as Cameron Mackintosh Productions, Glyndebourne, the National Theatres of Scotland and Wales, the RSC and many others.

Sian Alexander, Julie’s Bicycle’s associate director for theatre, says this shows that there is a “huge appetite” in the industry for tackling this issue. The plan is that companies will share information and ideas so that eventually Julie’s Bicycle will be “able to produce an annual report for theatre on GHG emissions and progress towards targets based on the data collected by the industry”. Given how secretive theatres can be about their plans and operations, it is good to see that differences are being overlooked in the face of this major challenge.

In fact, as the Stage recently explained, Julie’s Bicycle has already launched one major report about the impact that touring theatre has on the environment. They calculated that in 2009 British touring companies produced approximately 13,400 tonnes of greenhouse gases: equivalent to flying round the world 2,680 times. In one sense this is good news – Alexander points out that this figure is not as high as they had initially feared it might be – but she adds that there are also many areas where things could be improved.

As well as working directly with theatres, the organisation has provided a number of resources on its websites to enable companies to measure their impact themselves. These include a free carbon calculator, which theatres can use to work out what their carbon footprint is, and a range of other advice on how to become more energy-efficient.

Recent years have seen a range of shows – from Filter’s Water to the Bush’s Contingency Plan – that have sought to tackle climate change from an artistic point of view. So it’s good to see theatres attempting to be green not just in word, but in action too.

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Go to the Green Theater Initiative

Project GREENLIT in Denver Magazine

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Originally intended as a 15-minute DVD extra, Greenlit became an insightful 50-minute movie about the challenges of environmentalism, both in the film community, and the world at large. It even had a green score — Bailey enlisted composer Craig Richey to make instruments out of recycled water bottles and egg cartons. “I ended up learning so much that I had to let other filmmakers know how much we were wasting,” says Bailey, whose composting and waste management efforts were boosted by coproducer Lauren Selman, who heads up an environmental consulting firm called Reel Green Media. “We shot in a rural part of Oregon where there was no access to green technology, so we had to be creative,” says Selman. “Instead of using water bottles on set, we lugged our own water jugs.”

via Project GREENLIT – Denver Magazine – July 2010 – Denver, CO.

Soundwave Festival ((4)) Green Sound » July 9

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Featuring sound selections by Luc Meier with exhibition artists Jorge Bachmann, Agnes Szelag, Ben Bracken, Alan So, Suzanne Husky, Sam Easterson, Alyce Santoro, Reenie Charrière, Vaughn Bell, Elin Øyen Vister, Jessica Resmond

In Soundwave Festival’s most ambitious presentation ever, Green Sound mounts a special month-long exhibition and performance residency at The Lab. The Illuminated Forest is an imaginary world inside the gallery walls of San Francisco’s preeminent experimental art space that features a large immersive multi-media and interactive exhibit and performance installation from the collaborative minds of Agnes Szelag, Ben Bracken, Jorge Bachmann and Alan So, and environmental artist works by Vaughn Bell, Alyce Santoro, Sam Easterson, Reenie Charrière, Suzanne Husky, Elin Øyen Vister, and Jessica Resmond.

The main installation is manufactured by projections, sensors, MAX/MSP, sound, sculptural shapes and light/shadow where visitors become its inhabitants and part of its ecosystem: their presence activates both visual and auditory sensations, and leaves an imprint on the environment long after they are gone. It demonstrates our own connection to the environment and how we are all interconnected. Our presence in the environment affects this space and is forever changed (for better and for worse) with our temporal presence. This experiential exhibit actively reminds people what we do has impact: on our own lives, on others, and the world around us, both in the present and the future. It is a human reminder of the life existing outside our urban borders, its importance, and the power it can play in our lives while raising questions about a natural world lost.

The Forest will host experiential performances by some of the most compelling local, national and international artists and musicians. Inspired sound purveyors from across the sonic spectrum will explore themes of reinvention and recycling, real and imagined natural environments and creatures, endangered species, water, environmental awareness and responsibility, plantlife/animal life, and other artist imaginations.

In various eddies around the forest, artists re-imagine a place with Suzanne Husky’s textile trees and soft rocks, Sam Easterson’s animal-borne imaging, Vaughn Bell’s moving and wall mountains, Alyce Santoro’s Sonic Fabric, Jessica Resmond’s birds nests, Reenie Charrière’s Washed Up waterfall and Elin Øyen Vister’s Soundscape Røst installation on the birds of Røst archipelago in northern Norway.

Join us in celebrating the opening of The Illuminated Forest featuring sound selections by Luc Meier.

Born in Vevey, Switzerland, Luc Meierhas entertained an actively peripheral relationship to sound over the past decade. As a journalist, he has reported on contemporary music practices for magazines, newspapers and websites in Switzerland and elsewhere. At the same time, he has helped stage musical encounters and events in Switzerland, Japan, Korea and the U.S. Luc currently manages the art + technology programs of swissnex San Francisco (www.swissnexsanfrancisco.org) and has organized several sound art events in this capacity. Along the way, Luc has occasionally provided background music for the tinnitus crowd, with DJ-sets showing a clear bias towards accidental coherence over planned linearity. His collages typically run the gamut from the inaudible edges of electro-acoustics to Mexican techno via a shabby gotha of wayward tunesmiths and hauntologists.
http://www.swissnexsanfrancisco.org/

Jorge Bachmann is a photo-based, multimedia and sound artist. He has collected field recordings exploring the strange, unique and microcosmic sounds of everyday life. He creates sound atmospheres meant for deep listening and often composed in symbiosis with the sculptural installations exploring social and sensual constructs and experiences. [ruidobello] has exhibited and performed in North America, Europe, Japan and South America for the San Francisco Electronic Music Festival, MoBu Dance Group, and Soundwave Festival, amongst others. He has been Soundwave’s Technical Director and Resident Artist since 2005.
http://anihilo.com/
http://ruidobello.ch/

Agnes Szleg’s music, video and installation art has been featured in national and international festivals, on the radio, television, and in podcasts. Whatever medium she is working in, Agnes creates work which focuses on change and transformation – the glue can be as important as the pieces it holds together. Agnes received her MFA in Electronic Music and Recording Media from Mills College and her BA in Radio/TV/Film from Northwestern University. Her solo EP No Summer or Winter on Aphonia was hailed as “a distinctive voice in the electro-acoustic field” by Textura, and “gorgeous” by XLR8R. Agnes currently lives and works in the Bay Area.
http://www.aggiflex.com/

For the past 15 years,Ben Bracken has been creating a unique sonic language utilizing electronics, acoustic sound sources, guitar, and field recordings. Interested in the possibilities of echo-relocation in sound-based art, his work has oscillated between performance and installation, often blurring the lines between the two. The location of the event becomes an active participant, intimately shaping the nature and direction of each work. In the spring of 2006, Ben received his MFA in Electronic Music from Mills College. He currently resides in Oakland, CA and works at Cycling ’74, the developers of Max/MSP and Jitter.

As an artist, designer, producer and curator,Alan So has created and supported innovative art for over 15 years. Alan founded ME’DI.ATE in 1998 to provide a forum for diverse artists to showcase works to a world in desperate need of innovative ideas. In 2002 he began his exploration of sound as an artistic medium and, in 2004, launched the Soundwave festival. Soundwave has been featured in numerous media outlets, including San Francisco Magazine (Best of 2007 Award), Resonance FM (United Kingdom), PBS, and BBC. Alan has exhibited his work in the US and Canada and is concerned with issues of identity, social structure and place with an interest in the experimentation of form and concept. He has organized exhibitions and events Online, in New York City, the San Francisco Bay Area and his native Canada where he received his BDesign from Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design.
http://www.me-di-ate.net

Bay Area multimedia artist Suzanne Huskyobtained her MFA from Ecole des Beaux- Art of Bordeaux and has participated in artist residencies in Europe and the United States. Her art addresses environmental problems related to the exploitation of natural resources, landscape use and globalization. Suzanne’s sculpture, drawings and photography question the environmental, social and political agenda of the mainstream media. Her work observes and analyses in an inventory form that allows the nature of the subject to unveil and reveal its complexity. In the Bay Area, her work has been exhibited at the de Young Museum, Southern Exposure, Intersection For The Arts, The Lab, Headland Center for the Arts.
http://www.suzannehusky.com/

As a video naturalist,Sam Easterson is best known for his animal-borne imaging. His work has been exhibited in numerous museums, including the Whitney Museum of American Art, and featured on television networks, including the Sundance Channel and CBS’s Late Show with David Letterman. Sam also works as a museum professional; recently he developed video content for the Schad Gallery of Biodiversity at the Royal Ontario Museum. A graduate of The Cooper Union, he also received an MS in Landscape Architecture (University of Minnesota), and has received grants from the Durfee Foundation, the Creative Capital Foundation, and others. Sam is a recipient of the prestigious Louis Comfort Tiffany Prize.
http://www.sameasterson.com/

Alyce Santoro, an internationally noted conceptual and sound artist with a background in science and scientific illustration, is a kind of archivist – a compulsive collector of snippets of the natural environment (auditory and otherwise) – who incorporates her specimens into her art. Her multimedia “philosoprops” and “subtle reality technologies” employ sound and video, assemblage, and performance as part of a grand investigation into everyday phenomena. Santoro is best known as the inventor of SONIC FABRIC, an audible textile woven from recycled audiocassette tape. SONIC FABRIC has been the source of exhibitions and performances in museums, festivals and galleries around the world with features from the New York Times to the Sundance Channel to People Magazine. Her works are in private collections of the Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona, FIT Museum New York, FIDM Los Angeles and that of Phish percussionist Jon Fishman and legendary performance artist Laurie Anderson.
http://www.sonicfabric.com
http://www.alycesantoro.com

Reenie Charrière: I am an investigator of the environment surrounding my everyday actions. Art is a way to be present and reveal what may be blurred and discarded. I am a tourist wherever I go. I invite others to tour unadvertised locations, which may be right around the corner. I am most interested in the potential of under-noticed sites, and the juxtaposition of what is natural to what is synthetic. I look for what has gathered over time, and what continues to develop. Light, and line motivate the way things are situated in space. Living in the West but not being originally from here has broadened my sense of vastness and the potential of open spaces. Being overly curious and having my studio in Jack London Square has led me to collect from the Oakland estuary and compelled me to experiment with what is there, the tides, the salty water, and the tremendous washing up of plastic. I am deeply concerned about the pollution accumulating all around me. As a mixed media artist my work may take on a multi-sensory form in sculptural installation amplified by video or digital projections.
http://web.mac.com/rcharriere/

Vaughn Bell creates interactive projects and immersive environments that deal with how we relate to our environment. She has exhibited her sculpture, installation, performance, video and public projects internationally. Most recently, Vaughn created a commission for Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art and another for the Edith Russ Site for New Media Art in Oldenburg, Germany. Her work has been featured in Artnews, Afterimage, and Arcade Journal, among others. Vaughn received her MFA from the Studio for Inter-related Media at Massachusetts College of Art in Boston, MA and her undergraduate degree from Brown University. She currently is based in Seattle.
http://www.vaughnbell.net

Child of Klang aka Elin Øyen Vister is a Norwegian sound artist and composer. She has studied sound engineering, music technology, and popular musicology in Norway and England. She is also known under the alias DJ Sunshine, one of Norway’s most versatile and eclectic DJ´s. She was one of the pioneers on the Norwegian drum´n´bass scene in the 90íes. She has organized, curated and run festivals, festival programs and club programs nationwide and she has played records all over the world from Svalbard to Costa Rica.
http://childofklang.wordpress.com
http://www.myspace.com/childofklang

Jessica Resmond is a French American artist who received her BFA from California College of the Arts, San Francisco. Resmond’s work is conceptual and tactile. Its main interest lies within the existing tensions between biological rhythms & organisms, and the fast pace technology/economy driven global landscape. With a scientific background in molecular biology and a deep interest for nature’s ever evolving creative designs, her process, is one of constant research. Borders and boundaries are where exchanges take place, where transformation is possible and new understanding arise. Her work includes site specific installations, interactive or multimedia sculptures and experimental collaborations.
http://www.jessicaresmond.com
http://www.meicollectiv.com

via Soundwave Festival ((4)) Green Sound » July 9.

Elements: An Eco-Art Conference.

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Have I made it clear? I’m a conference junkie.

Ain’t nothing better than being in a room full of smart people and listening to them talk about the smart things they’ve done. With smart words and smart brains. And especially now, when the green conferences are sprouting up every-which-where, like volunteer plants or something, you can listen to the experienced and the earthy-heroic, all at once. Smart and savory, your basic brain food.

But, unlike most green, super green, shiny-slick-looka-me-green conferences (and boy, do I love those), the producers of the Elements Eco Art Conference were exclusively women, and women with a very clear stated agenda: they were The Northern California Women’s Caucus for Art.

That official part explains the special certificate bestowed upon the conference by Assemblywoman Nancy Skinner. But it also explains the style of the conference itself. Held in the shiny-green David Brower Center, bereft of plastic bottles but packed with compostables and a small altar, Elements was a gathering of some of the women who have been doing this eco-art thing for a long time. In some cases, 10 years. In some cases, 40. In most cases, before you figured out that it was a pretty cool thing.

And so we heard from Susan Leibovitz Steinman and the Recology Artists in Residence. And so we heard from Tierney Thys and Andree Singer Thompson. In the meantime, the presenters talked through a stream of technical glitches, and you could make art postcards and trade them, and we all looked under our seats when somebody lost a notebook. Because despite the fact that much of the work discussed was ground-breaking, iconic or simply Hella Good, the focus never strayed from its purpose. That we were here for the art, not the artist, that we were gathered for a purpose, not a form.

Now, don’t get me wrong. Nobody was barefoot. There were no drum circles. There was a bit of a libation, but no sage. The refreshing thing lacking was the ego. The puffed-out-chest of “I’m smart and here to talk about my smartness.” Which I usually love. It was refreshingly absent. It was, simply, all about the work, and the places the work was from.

Maybe it’s just humbling when your power-point doesn’t work, or when you know everyone in the room by name, or when you just get to make art in service to the planet. And it doesn’t have anything to do with being a lady. But regardless, Leibovitz-Steinman said a smart thing: “Many young women today think they don’t need to be feminist . . . but the fact is we’re standing on the shoulders of these women.” She’s got a chart that lays it all out for you, all the way back to Silent Spring, the work of another grounded woman. Was she even a feminist?

I’ll be taking tomorrow to go over more of the smart details, but for now, my brain is fed.

Go to the Green Museum