MEGAPOLIS HQ

Pierre Menard Gallery, 10 Arrow St, Harvard Square, Cambridge
Hours:
Saturday, 9am – 6pm
Sunday, 10am – 4pm

Installations

Amorgos – Laura Vitale

Amorgos is a very small Cycladic island from which come the water sounds in this constructed multi-channel acoustic environment. Through Ethan Philbrick’s (cello), Hannah Marcus’s (violin and voice), and Rick Moody’s (voice) collaboration with Vitale’s prepared sounds of water, the listener is invited to enter into an exploratory sound environment, to rest in the nebulous area between music and sound, rhythm and water.

Laura Vitale is an artist living and working in New York City. She has been working in radio art and sound design for five years. Her work focuses on the literary, painterly, and of course musical potentials of sound. She is also a member of the production company Piehole, an experimental puppet group. She graduated with a degree in Visual Art from Brown University in 2006. Her work has been aired in many cities including WBEZ Chicago and Resonance FM London, as part of the St. Marks Poetry Project, and at Palestine Gallery in Chicago. She is a 2008 Van Lier Fellow at Harvestworks Digital Media Arts Center.

Bric-à-Brac – Lisa Abbatomarco & Noé Cuéllar

(found in the Democracy Center, 45 Mt. Auburn St., Cambridge)
Bric-à-Brac is a one hour-long sound piece for radio predominated by spoken text in the form of imaginary recipes, procedures, conversions, and translations. Unlike ordinary cooking shows, Bric-à-Brac will encourage the listener to make up their own ingredients and recipes by using the primary ingredient of imagination. The Bric, marinated under the influence of the whimsical writings of Lewis Carroll and Edward Lear uses multiple list forms, inexistent words, formulas, sound effects, tangential vocalization, and field recordings. All of which will enhance the text by interpreting it in literal or contrasting ways. In this incarnation, Noé Cuéllar and Lisa Abbatomarco create a soundscape under the façade of old-time radio. Using vintage radios, they establish a space in which the listener experiences selected sections of the piece.

Noé Cuéllar is Texan a sound designer and photographer graduating from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago this spring. His work comprises composition, text and musical elements. A variety of his work has been performed or exhibited at the 2008 Third Coast International Audio Festival, New Music at the Green Mill and Looptopia (Chicago), Neighborhood Public Radio/Whitney Biennial, Sound Art Space (Laredo, TX), among others. He has scored films and performances by National Headquarters, Antibody Dance, and Standing Point Films. Cuéllar frequents close artistic collaborations with Jeff Gburek, Anki Hannemann, and Lisa Abbatomarco.

Lisa Abbat0marc0 is a performance artist with a c0mprehensive backgr0und in visual and perf0rming arts. Her 2o-year career has included impr0visational theater, puppetry, s0und p0etry and s0und installati0n. Her s0und pieces are 0ften multi-channeled and multi-layered and invite the listener t0 intimately engage in the experience. Her m0st recent w0rk, J0urney to the Inner 0utsider Ear, was exhibited at the 2oo8 Third C0ast Festival in Chicag0. It featured twelve 1minute s0und c0mp0sitions derived fr0m 0ver 4o field rec0rdings all h0used within a suitcase 0f film canisters. Lisa has als0 been kn0wn to discuss Peter Gena and m0llusks in the same half h0ur. M0st recent artistic c0mrades include N0é Cuéllar & Justin Cabrill0s.

Chorus of Refuge – Ann Hepperman, Kara Oehler & Jason Cady

Chorus of Refuge is a sound installation that transmits the stories of six refugees, living in different cities across the U.S. to six radios. The voices of the refugees are superimposed and coordinated in both rhythm and tonality to unite their narratives of struggle, survival and triumph.

Ann Heppermann and Kara Oehler are Peabody-award winning public radio producers and media artists based in Brooklyn and Boston. Their stories and long-form documentaries have aired on public radio shows including: This American Life, Morning Edition, Weekend America, BBC, CBC, Radio Lab, Re:Sound, Marketplace and numerous others. Individually and collectively, their work has been exhibited at Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), UnionDocs and the Conflux Festival, among other venues.

Jason Cady is a composer of dramatic vocal works and experimental chamber music. In his recent operas, he has set colloquial American vernacular, canned laughter, and Foley sound effects within the context of Baroque operatic forms to reveal the unexpected in the mundane. Cady has an M.A. from Wesleyan University, where he studied composition with Alvin Lucier and Anthony Braxton. He currently lives in Brooklyn, New York

Campfire Story – Gang Clan Mafia

Campfire Story is a live, improvised sound and video installation-scape. In our search for improvised travel, we’ve decided to go camping and take the audience along with two sonic tents, a televised campfire, and a sonic tale told around the video camp light.

Gang Clan Mafia creates improvised, live sound. It is a sound collage, landscape, journey and conversation. Video, installation, and performance actions are used as a visual Transportation Pod. Gang Clan Mafia is Vela Phelan (turntable, samplers, knobs, transmissions, ∆.) and Dirk Adams (found sound, constructed sound, mic, effects).

Live Experiments in Human Energy Exchange – Deb Todd Wheeler & David O’Brien

The endless loop tape cartridge was first designed in 1952 around a single reel carrying a continuous loop of plastic, oxide-coated recording tape running at 3.75 in per second. From 1965 until its eventual demise in 1982, 8 track recording was the hippest, cutting edge technology in music. David O’Brien and Deb Todd Wheeler reach into this nostalgic technology, along with the 8 track sound stylings of Wayne Newton and Pink Floyd, among many others, and let the viewer determine running speed, and thus the soundscape, of this blown apart 8 track player by pedaling a tricked-out stationary bike that also functions as the power generator. Special 8 track recording sessions will also be arranged.

David O’Brien is an Exhibit Designer and Fabricator at Mystic Scenic Studios in Norwood, MA. His interactive system designs and constructions are in use locally in exhibits at the Museum of Science, the Decordova Museum, the New England Aquarium and the Boston Children’s Museum. He has assisted artists in the Boston area with his technical expertise for many years. His own work, which consists primarily of microcontroller driven electronic constructions, has been shown at the FPAC Gallery in Boston and the Nesto Gallery in Milton, MA

Deb Todd Wheeler is on the Graduate Faculty at the Art Institute of Boston, and also teaches in the Metals Department at Massachusetts College of Art. Recently her work has shown at the Kohler Arts Center Project Space in Wisconsin, University Art Gallery in Cedar Falls, Iowa, The Gallery at Green Street, Allston Skirt Gallery and Miller Block Gallery in Boston. She is a current Joan Mitchell Foundation grant nominee, and has been the recipient of numerous awards, including an individual artist grant from the Artist Resource Trust, a LEF Contemporary Work Fund Artist grant in Inter-media, and a Massachusetts Cultural Council Grant in Sculpture and Installation.

Supplied by the Public – 31 Down Radio Theater

Supplied By The Public is a telephone-to-radio system. During the festival you can call a 1-800 number to record comments, interviews, performances, or just shout-outs. These recordings will be streamed on Internet radio. Number and URL to be provided during the festival.

Telephones can be linked to a radio broadcast in order to create a dialogue between social groups during public demonstrations and events/festivals. Our project is based on the concept of the 1966 work by Max Neuhaus titled, “Public Supply.” Neuhaus’s revolutionary telephone/radio work was sponsored by WBAI in New York City and has been recreated in other cities. Sadly, Neuhaus passed away early in 2009.

A workshop will be given to illustrate the technology involved in creating this project, featuring an Asterisk PBX and the software Pure Data. This piece is supported by free103point9 and features the work of Ryan Holsopple and Lee Azzarello.

31 Down creates audio-based performance work with a heavy emphasis on imagery and mood. There is an invested use of new technologies and interactive systems to create and control the performances; all of the works are automated and controlled by the performers on stage. Recent performance history includes productions at various NYC and national venues, including: The Ontological Incubator, New Museum, The Kitchen, Rhizome, free103point9 Transmission Arts, EXIT ART, White Box/PERFORMA 05, Participant, Eyebeam, and WFMU.

WorkingStories – Karen I. Westphalen

WorkingStories is an audio documentary about life in the the sex industry. It is a series of stories told by prostitutes, exotic dancers, dominatrixes, phone sex operators, porn actors and porn producers. WorkingStories addresses many themes such as how people got into sex work, coming out to one’s family, getting arrested, romantic relationships, and more. This project presents a frequently misunderstood and demonized group of people as complete human beings with full lives, real personalities and individual experiences.

Karen I. Westphalen has Bachelor’s degrees in music and civil engineering. In addition to editing WorkingStories, her recent projects include a grant-funded solo photography show focused on bridges in Lowell, MA; writing music and recording sound effects for B. Will Derd, a one-man non-verbal comedy show presented at Improv Boston; and arranging rock tunes for the Lowell High School Jazz Band.