BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//Emerson Contemporary - ECPv6.15.20//NONSGML v1.0//EN
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:PUBLISH
X-WR-CALNAME:Emerson Contemporary
X-ORIGINAL-URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org
X-WR-CALDESC:Events for Emerson Contemporary
REFRESH-INTERVAL;VALUE=DURATION:PT1H
X-Robots-Tag:noindex
X-PUBLISHED-TTL:PT1H
BEGIN:VTIMEZONE
TZID:America/New_York
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0500
TZOFFSETTO:-0400
TZNAME:EDT
DTSTART:20220313T070000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0400
TZOFFSETTO:-0500
TZNAME:EST
DTSTART:20221106T060000
END:STANDARD
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0500
TZOFFSETTO:-0400
TZNAME:EDT
DTSTART:20230312T070000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0400
TZOFFSETTO:-0500
TZNAME:EST
DTSTART:20231105T060000
END:STANDARD
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0500
TZOFFSETTO:-0400
TZNAME:EDT
DTSTART:20240310T070000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0400
TZOFFSETTO:-0500
TZNAME:EST
DTSTART:20241103T060000
END:STANDARD
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0500
TZOFFSETTO:-0400
TZNAME:EDT
DTSTART:20250309T070000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0400
TZOFFSETTO:-0500
TZNAME:EST
DTSTART:20251102T060000
END:STANDARD
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0500
TZOFFSETTO:-0400
TZNAME:EDT
DTSTART:20260308T070000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0400
TZOFFSETTO:-0500
TZNAME:EST
DTSTART:20261101T060000
END:STANDARD
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0500
TZOFFSETTO:-0400
TZNAME:EDT
DTSTART:20270314T070000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0400
TZOFFSETTO:-0500
TZNAME:EST
DTSTART:20271107T060000
END:STANDARD
END:VTIMEZONE
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20260326T120000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20260326T130000
DTSTAMP:20260502T055112
CREATED:20260205T013852Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20260428T172741Z
UID:10000146-1774526400-1774530000@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:In Conversation: Julia Krupa and Eileen Ryan
DESCRIPTION:Thursday\, March 26\, 12–1 PM \n\n\n\nJoin us for a conversation with artists Julia Krupa and Eileen Ryan as they discuss their work in A Sentient Land: Aesthetic Alliances with Forests\, Beetles\, Salt\, and Air. \n\n\n\nKrupa and Ryan will explore their innovative artistic practices that blur the boundaries between creator and material. Through methods\, including oral history and specimen collection\, forge collaborative relationships with natural elements—inviting beetles and herbs to become active participants in the creative process. \n\n\n\nThis conversation delves into the intersections of science\, aesthetics\, and spirituality that shape their work. Together\, these artists\, who created immersive installations in A Sentient Land\, address questions central to the exhibition: How do we translate on behalf of non-human materials? What role do speculation and anthropomorphism play in fostering interspecies connections? How can artistic practice generate greater empathy and hope for our shared future? \n\n\n\nFree and open to the public. A Sentient Land: Aesthetic Alliances with Forests\, Beetles\, Salt\, and Air is on view through March 28\, 2026\, at Emerson Contemporary\, 25 Avery Street\, Boston.
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/in-conversation-julia-krupa-and-eileen-ryan/
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Artist Talk,Gallery Talk,Public Program
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2026/02/Screenshot-2026-02-04-at-4.06.36-PM.png
ORGANIZER;CN="Emerson Contemporary":MAILTO:contemporary@emerson.edu
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20260122T120000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20260122T130000
DTSTAMP:20260502T055112
CREATED:20260111T013551Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20260428T190614Z
UID:10000144-1769083200-1769086800@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:In Conversation: Nelly-Eve Rajotte and Margaux Crump
DESCRIPTION:Top: Margaux Crump\, bottom: Nelly-Eve Rajotte. \n\n\n\n\n\nIn conjunction with A Sentient Land: Aesthetic Alliances with Forests\, Beetles\, Salt\, and Air \n\n\n\nThursday\, January 22\, 2026 | 12–1 PMEmerson Contemporary25 Avery Street\, Boston\, MA 02111 \n\n\n\nJoin artists Nelly-Eve Rajotte and Margaux Crump for an intimate conversation about their innovative practices of collaboration with the natural world. \n\n\n\nRajotte will discuss her work with bio-sonification and how she enables trees to generate their own sonic landscapes\, including her installation Les arbres communiquent entre eux à 220 hertz\, which translates forest communication into immersive audiovisual experience. Crump will share insights into her process of working with materials as co-creators\, exploring how stones\, beetles\, and other elements inform the artistic outcome. \n\n\n\nTogether\, they’ll explore questions at the heart of A Sentient Land: How do we share authorship with non-human collaborators? What does it mean to translate on behalf of materials? How can art deepen our empathy and connection across species? \n\n\n\nThis conversation offers a rare opportunity to hear directly from two artists reimagining the relationship between maker and material\, challenging us to consider the agency of the more-than-human world. \n\n\n\nFree and open to the publicNo registration required
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/in-conversation-nelly-eve-rajotte-and-margaux-crump/
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Artist Talk,Public Program
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2026/01/Screenshot-2026-01-10-at-8.19.06-PM.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20251119T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20251119T193000
DTSTAMP:20260502T055112
CREATED:20251024T204436Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251112T201331Z
UID:10000135-1763575200-1763580600@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:In Conversation: Artists Jack Gruman and Logan Puleikis of VHF Studio will be talking with Malic Amalya
DESCRIPTION:Wednesday\, November 19\, Artists talk 6:30- 7:30pm\, 6pm doors –  \n\n\n\nIn Conversation: Artists Jack Gruman and Logan Puleikis of VHF Studio will talk with Malic Amalya\, Assistant Professor of Experimental Media and Film Production\, about the conceptual underpinnings of their installation “Narcissus look back: and they love you\,” that is currently on view at the Emerson Media Art Gallery until December 13th. \n\n\n\nThis embodied\, multi-sensory experience with a camp aesthetic explores loneliness as a collective experience in our current moment. They will discuss the tenuous and often shifting relationship between spectator and performer\, loops of identity\, and the duality of being haunted/haunting. With Malic Amalaya\, the artists will discuss major influences on their piece\, the political and moral values intrinsic to their work\, and the challenges they’ve faced making and relating to art at this socio-political moment. \n\n\n\n\nVHF STUDIO is a new media collective founded by artists Jack Gruman and Logan Puleikis. As collaborators they make genre-defying installation work\, blurring the boundaries of “low” and “high” art. They pull inspiration from the queer club scene\, haunted houses\, and popular media to create high concept large-scale multi-channel video and sound installations. \n\n\n\n\nModerated by Dr. Leonie Bradbury \n\n\n\nLocation: Media Art Gallery\, 25 Avery Street\, Boston\, MA
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/in-conversation-artists-jack-gruman-and-logan-puleikis-of-vhf-studio-will-be-talking-with-malic-amalya/
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Artist Talk,Gallery Talk,Public Program
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2025/07/VHF_Narcissuss_2.jpeg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20251106T120000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20251106T130000
DTSTAMP:20260502T055112
CREATED:20251024T203624Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251106T154515Z
UID:10000134-1762430400-1762434000@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:In Conversation: Artists Margaux Crump and Ash Eliza Williams **on ZOOM**
DESCRIPTION:Thursday\, November 6 *On ZOOM* 12:00 – 1:00 PM \n\n\n\nIn Conversation: Learn how artists Margaux Crump and Ash Eliza Williams collaborate with non-human beings to create artwork. Meeting LINK . \n\n\n\nAsh and Margaux consider the natural world an active contributor of aesthetic meaning. They will each describe their current art-making ideas and processes and discuss ideas raised by the exhibitions in which they are showing.  \n\n\n\nThis is a joint program between Emerson Contemporary and Sala 1\, Rome\, Italy. Ash Eliza Williams is a visual artist showing in Learning with Trees\, an exhibition at Sala 1 curated by Martina Tanga. Margaux Crump is a visual artist showing in a sentient land; artistic alliances with forests\, beetles\, salt\, and air\, curated by Shana Dumont Garr and opening at Emerson Contemporary\, Media Art Gallery in January 2026. \n\n\n\n \n\n\n\nMargaux Crump\, photo by Feast Day / @FeastDayStudio\n\n\n\nMargaux Crump is an interdisciplinary artist and researcher exploring the entanglements between magic\, ecology\, and the spiritual Imagination. Born in Houston\, TX\, she spent her childhood playing in gardens where she was steeped in ancestral fairy lore. These experiences wove quietly through the background of her work\, until she returned to Houston after earning her MFA in studio art from Washington University in St. Louis. With a renewed interest in the folklore and myths she grew up with\, she immersed herself in the study of esotericism and ecology. She is currently investigating the phenomena of the unseen\, from the microscopic to the mythic worlds that surround us. Taking form primarily through sculpture\, photography\, painting\, and ritual\, her work traces threads of the mythic\, magical\, and imaginal across disciplines and histories in search of how they inhabit and trouble the present. \n\n\n\nAsh Eliza Williams\n\n\n\nAsh Eliza Williams grew up in the Blue Ridge Mountains in SW Virginia. Ash is a painter and multidisciplinary artist making work about interspecies communication\, non-human language\, and more vibrant methods of connection.  Recent exhibitions include the Museum of Contemporary Art\, Denver\, the Anderson Museum\, and the Chautauqua Institute.  Ash often works with scientists\, including as an artist-in-residence at Shoals Marine Laboratory\, Sitka Center for Art and Ecology\, the Museum of Comparative Zoology\, and Mountain Lake Biological Station as a Lucille Walton Fellow. Ash is currently a 2025 – 2026 Roswell Foundation Artist-in-Residence.
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/in-conversation-artists-margaux-crump-and-ash-eliza-williams/
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Artist Talk,Public Program
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2025/10/Screenshot-2025-10-28-at-2.06.24-PM.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20250611T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20250614T235959
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20250607T155754Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250607T155756Z
UID:10000112-1749600000-1749945599@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:Foresta-Inclusive: (ex)tending towards\, by Jane Tingley
DESCRIPTION:Emerson Contemporary has joined hands with the International Computer Music Conference (ICMC)\, one of the world’s largest and most prestigious gatherings of sound artists\, electroacoustic composers\, and music technologists from across the globe. As a part of the installation track of ICMC 2025\, presenting Foresta-Inclusive: (ex)tending towards\, by Jane Tingley – on display at Emerson Contemporary’s Media Art Gallery from June 11th – 14th. \n\n\n\n(ex)tending towards is driven by sensor data collected using the Foresta-Inclusive infrastructure at the rare Charitable Reserve in Blaire\, ON. CA. This infrastructure includes three networked ecosensors that are installed unobtrusively onto the trunk of a tree and sense phenomenon such as: temperature\, humidity\, VOCs\, particulate matter\, wind\, C02 and rain. The in-gallery installation is composed of three main components: 1) a visualization that images 24hrs of collected data\, where the outer ring shows contemporary values and each subsequent smaller ring images the values from the previous hour\, 2) a point cloud of the tree being sensed\, and 3) the soundscape that sonifies the collected data. This work uses a simple gestural interaction to allow the participant to move into the 3D space of the visualization to explore the deep time of the tree’s life. The slower one moves the easier it becomes to inspect each ring of the tree’s experience. \n\n\n\nForesta inclusive: (ex)tending towards installed at the Ottawa School of Art Gallery Orléans. 2024.\n\n\n\nIn response to the temporal difference between tree and human individuals\, this work explores ways to slow down human engagement\, and to make visible the daily experience of a tree. The aim of the work is to find ways to demonstrate the absolute liveliness of the natural world as it unfolds all around us – yet more often than not beyond our limited sensory perception. The first visualization materializes data as a particle flow field that gently undulates and is affected in real time by changing data. Inspired by tree rings as evidence of yearly experience\, the visualization is structured in the same manner and visualizes the last 24hrs of the tree’s life\, where the outer ring shows contemporary values and each subsequent smaller ring the values from the previous hour. To interact with this visualization\, there is a one-meter-tall cork cylinder that is also a scent sculpture\, which releases the scent of geosmin (the scent of a forest after it rains) every time it rains in the forest.  \n\n\n\nTo interact\, the participant uses a simple gestural interaction to move spatially into the visualization. The slower one moves\, enables the participant to inspect each ring. The interface is embedded in soil\, which also contain a set of sculptural sensor pods. Next to the visualization is a point cloud visualization of the tree at the rare Charitable Reserve. The point cloud was captured by a LIDAR scan of the forest at rare using a very large drone and rendered using Touch Designer. This point cloud is also affected in real time by live data. Like the visuals\, the sonic elements materialize the forest data in a generative sound experience that balances between mimicry and poetic memory of forest experience.  \n\n\n\nFig. 2. Visualization\n\n\n\nIn its entirety this installation creates an embodied exploratory space where the deep time of a tree’s life is remembered\, and the human body is slowed down in the engagement. \n\n\n\nArtist Statement \n\n\n\nJane Tingley is an artist\, curator\, director of the SLOlab (Systems | Life | Ontologies) andAssociate Professor at York University. Her studio work combines traditional studiopractice with new media tools – and spans responsive/interactive installation\,performative robotics\, and telematically connected distributed sculptures/installations.Her works are interdisciplinary in nature and explore the creation of spaces andexperiences that push the boundaries between science and magic\, interactivity andplayfulness. \n\n\n\nHrysovalanti Fereniki Maheras\, also known as Hryso\, is a computational art practitionerspecializing in generative audiovisual art simulations and electronic kinetic art. Shecollaborated on the sound design of this project. Currently a Ph.D. candidate inComputational Arts at York University\, she also serves as a studio instructor foraudiovisual arts. Hryso’s artistic exploration involves seamlessly traversing betweenvirtual and physical technological realms\, aiming to create art that investigates theemergence of a virtual analog environment within a shared\, intricate physical habitat. \n\n\n\nACKNOWLEDGMENTSFaadhi Fauzi: Three.js Web developmentKavi – Ilze Briede: 3D modelling and Touch DesignerMarius Kintel: Firmware and MQTT VCR development \n\n\n\n(ex)tending towards – on display at Emerson Contemporary’s Media Art Gallery from June 11th – 14th.
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/foresta-inclusive-extending-towards-by-jane-tingley/
LOCATION:Emerson Media Art Gallery\, 25 Avery Street\, Boston\, Massachusetts\, 02111\, United States
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Exhibition
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2025/06/Liminal.jpeg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20250611T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20250614T235959
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20250607T155041Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250607T155119Z
UID:10000111-1749600000-1749945599@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:Liminal by Zhitao Lin
DESCRIPTION:Emerson Contemporary has joined hands with the International Computer Music Conference (ICMC)\, one of the world’s largest and most prestigious gatherings of sound artists\, electroacoustic composers\, and music technologists from across the globe. As a part of the installation track of ICMC 2025\, presenting Liminal – on display at Emerson Contemporary’s Media Art Gallery from June 11th – 14th. \n\n\n\nStill image from the documentary video Shell Art – Mother of Pearl\, published by Meet Qingdao onYouTube (2023). Used here for cultural reference.\n\n\n\nLiminal is an AI-driven audiovisual installation by Zhitao Lin that transforms tra-ditional Chinese aesthetics into a generative\, interactive experience. Inspired by the mythical Peach Blossom Spring\, the piece uses real-time gesture tracking to control the sound of Guqin\, Xiao\, and percussion\, along with dynamic digital ink landscapes rendered as 3D particle systems. Only one audience member is tracked at a time\, allowing for a focused and intimate interaction. Each motion becomes a brushstroke in both sound and image\, creating a deeply personal and ephemeral version of this imagined utopia.At the heart of Liminal is a custom gesture-mapping system driven by computer vision. A high-frame-rate camera captures the participant’s hand and body movements in real time. The left hand triggers and modulates sounds derived from traditional Chinese percussion and xiao (bamboo flute)\, while the right hand controls timbral and articulatory variations of guqin-like textures\, such as harmonics and arpeggios. These movements simultaneously influence a custom 3D particle system\, generating visuals reminiscent of dynamic ink wash paintings. The result is an evolving visual environment that fuses digital abstraction with references to natural landscapes and lacquered ornamentation. \n\n\n\nA Generated visual output from Liminal\, illustrating gesture-driven 3D particle ink landscape.Image by Zhitao Lin.\n\n\n\nSound in Liminal is shaped through a real-time gestural mapping system. Using a high-frame-rate camera\, the installation tracks the participant’s hand and body movements to control and modulate sonic elements derived from guqin\, xiao\, and percussive textures. Each gesture dynamically alters parameters such as pitch articulation\, layering\, and spatialization—allowing the participant to sculpt a con- tinuously evolving soundscape through motion alone. \n\n\n\nDesigned for one-on-one interaction\, the installation maintains focus and clarity by tracking a single participant at a time. This enables highly responsive audio-visual interplay and encourages an intimate\, reflective mode of engagement. \n\n\n\nEach interaction becomes a unique and ephemeral composition\, situated at the intersection of body\, machine\, and cultural resonance. Liminal invites participants into a space where gestures function as both input and authorship\, transforming embodied presence into real-time audiovisual expression. It offers a sensory environment where memory\, movement\, and technology coalesce—evoking a digitally mediated encounter with introspection and transformation. \n\n\n\n \n\n\n\nArtist Statement \n\n\n\nZhitao Lin is a forward-thinking composer whose work bridges traditional Chinese aesthetics\, spectral music\, and cutting-edge technology. Currently a Doctor of Musical Arts (DMA) candidate in Composition at the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University\, he also holds a Master’s degree in Composition from Peabody and a Bachelor’s degree in Music from the University of California\, Berkeley. His research focuses on the intersection of artificial intelligence and music composition\, exploring new possibilities in sound art through deep technological integration.Lin’s work spans chamber music\, orchestral compositions\, opera\, electronic music\, and multimedia sound installations\, earning recognition for its fusion of cultural depth and technological innovation. By blending Chinese musical traditions with spectral techniques and AI-driven creativity\, he crafts a sonic world that is both avant-garde and deeply evocative. Influenced by Zen philosophy\, his compositions often evoke a surreal\, mystical quality\, transforming abstract musical narratives into immersive experiences. His practice continues to explore new human-machine collaborations that expand the boundaries of musical expression. \n\n\n\nLiminal – on display at Emerson Contemporary’s Media Art Gallery from June 11th – 14th.
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/liminal-by-zhitao-lin/
LOCATION:Emerson Media Art Gallery\, 25 Avery Street\, Boston\, Massachusetts\, 02111\, United States
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Exhibition
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2025/06/Liminal.jpeg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20250611T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20250614T235959
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20250606T145410Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250607T174036Z
UID:10000110-1749600000-1749945599@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:MELT: the memory of ice (topographic remix)\, by Betsey Biggs
DESCRIPTION:Emerson Contemporary has joined hands with the International Computer Music Conference (ICMC)\, one of the world’s largest and most prestigious gatherings of sound artists\, electroacoustic composers\, and music technologists from across the globe. As a part of the installation track of ICMC 2025\, presenting Betsey Bigg’s MELT: the memory of ice – on display at Emerson Contemporary’s Media Art Gallery from June 11th – 14th. \n\n\n\nStill\, MELT: the memory of ice (topographic remix)\, 2024\n\n\n\nBetsey made MELT after wandering around the world’s most active glacier\, in Ilullisat\, Greenland\, with her mother and 5-year-old daughter and the film’s cinematographer\, Troy Fairbanks. All synthesizers are made out of processed field recordings from this trip. The slow film stills and music are increasingly interrupted by audiovisual glitches\, representing tipping points of our warming climate; the timing of these glitches was determined by a Max patch converting sea ice extent data to probability. \n\n\n\nThe vocal music was created collaboratively with the members of Moving Star vocal ensemble from an open score Betsey composed. The music was recorded by Jeff Cook at 2nd Story Sound\, mixed by Michael Hammond of Big Ship Audio\, and the spatial Dolby Atmos mix was created with Sean Winters. The film itself premiered at the IMAX Theatre at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nOn MELT: the memory of ice\, Betsey writes\, “As an installation\, I wanted to truly use the gallery space to do something more than just press play on a movie\, to explore the imaginative possibilities of transforming and relocating the sounds and visuals\, to create a new kind of space for the audience to wander through. The visual transformations\, especially\, allow me to understand the images in a different\, more imaginary way: a kind of inner topography. So I’ve titled this installation work MELT: the memory of ice (topographic remix).“ \n\n\n\nArtist Statement \n\n\n\nBetsey Biggs (Writer/Director/Composer) is a composer and media artist whose workconnects the dots between sound\, image\, place and technology. Her work has been described by the New Yorker as “psychologically complex\, exposing how we orient ourselves with our ears.” For more than twenty-five years\, she has composed music\, created live multimedia performances\, and created participatory art installations. She earned a Ph.D. in music composition at Princeton University\, and has taught music\, multimedia\, public art\, photography\, and video at Brown University\, RISD\, and the University of Colorado Boulder\, where she currently serves as Assistant Professor of Critical Media Practices. \n\n\n\nTroy Fairbanks (Director of Photography) has a well-rounded filmmaking career as adirector\, videographer\, cinematographer\, and drone operator. His Denver production companies\, Makēda Creative and Rise Aerials\, specialize in action sports\, documentaries\, and drone cinematography. He has created more than 800 video projects in 31 countries\, with a special focus on flying FPV drones for commercial purposes. When he’s not behind the camera\, you can find Troy and his wife traveling the world in their converted school bus\, enjoying the outdoors and board sports\, and chasing one adventure or another. \n\n\n\nMoving Star is a vocal ensemble creating original music infused with improvisation. They are an artistic community partner of the Carnegie Hall Education Wing. The performers of Moving Star have collaborated with Meredith Monk\, Julia Wolfe\, Ann Hamilton\, and SufjanStevens\, and have performed at Zankel Hall\, Whitney Museum\, La MaMa\, Symphony Space\,and elsewhere. \n\n\n\nMELT: the memory of ice – on display at Emerson Contemporary’s Media Art Gallery from June 11th – 14th.
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/melt-the-memory-of-ice-topographic-remix-by-betsey-biggs/
LOCATION:Emerson Media Art Gallery\, 25 Avery Street\, Boston\, Massachusetts\, 02111\, United States
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Exhibition
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-06-at-10.54.34-AM.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20250611T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20250614T235959
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20250606T141851Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250607T155220Z
UID:10000109-1749600000-1749945599@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:Entrainment (2023 - ongoing)\, by Shomit Barua
DESCRIPTION:Emerson Contemporary has joined hands with the International Computer Music Conference (ICMC)\, one of the world’s largest and most prestigious gatherings of sound artists\, electroacoustic composers\, and music technologists from across the globe. As a part of the installation track of ICMC 2025\, presenting Shomit Barua’s Entrainment – on display at Emerson Contemporary’s Media Art Gallery from June 11th – 14th. \n\n\n\nMulti-channel video + multi-channel audio\, original footage aboard rail-based public transportation inBrooklyn\, Budapest\, Lisbon\, Montreal\, and Barcelona; 16min audio + 60min video cycle\n\n\n\nEntrainment is part of a series of phenomenological experiments that explore the theme of spatial and temporal disorientation. Inspired by the passing landscape viewed from subways and trains\, this audio-video installation employs several motion-based perceptual distortions: 1) the Doppler effect\, 2) Moiré interference patterns\, 3) skewed parallax (binocular disparity)\, and 4) the Wagon wheel effect. Entrainment refers to the synchronization of organisms to an external perceived rhythm. \n\n\n\nThis installation recreates the hypnotic and transcendental states that often emerge from the repetitious visual\, auditory\, and haptic polyrhythms experienced aboard a moving train. Original portrait-mode footage is “temporally collaged” and spatially arranged to reconstruct views from rail-based public transportation in Barcelona\, Budapest\, Lisbon\, Montreal and New York. \n\n\n\nEntrainment at SMOCA – Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (2024-2025)\n\n\n\nEntrainment\, originally entitled Entrainment718\, was inspired by a hundred-foot stretch of the Brooklyn F train that connects the subterranean to the above-ground. On this transitional stretch\, the visual interplay of regularly-spaced pylons against haphazardly strung high-intensity work lights causes a skewing of parallax— looking out the window\, depth perception becomes distorted\, as though suddenly careening through a starfield. Entrainment is an exploration of that sense of disorientation\, and the hypnotic and transcendental states that often emerge from the repetitious visual\, auditory\, and haptic polyrhythms experienced aboard a moving train. This project continues to grow\, include footage from rail-based public transportation from around the world. \n\n\n\nAudio consists of a multi-channel sound system arranged linearly. The original musical composition (16mins) consists of several textural layers that are distributed spatially\, running up and down the multi-channel array in gated sequences. The effect is that of a passing train\, while also evoking the rhythmic quality of being on board the train. Each channel is synced with the video panel directly behind it and when that audio channel is active\, a variety of visual effects is applied to the corresponding panel.  \n\n\n\nIn this way\, one can visually track the sonic placement of sound in space (source-bonding [1] à la Denis Smalley’s Spectromorphology). Additionally\, a haptic channel plays infrasonic polyrhythmic patterns. The auditory (score length vs spatial distribution)\, visual (footage vs effects programming) and haptic layers are all cycles of different lengths.  \n\n\n\nAs they loop\, the layers stack in new combinations. This gestalt of sensory information that drift in and out of synchronization is an example of the nested or overlapping rhythms described in Henri Lefebvre’s Rhythmanalysis [2]\, in which the body becomes a metronome that not only observes but feels—embodies—temporal perception. \n\n\n\n\n\nMost notably\, the panoramic is actually a single-channel portrait-mode video (60mins) shot on a camera-phone\, repeated 14 times and mirrored vertically. Each column is an instance of the original footage offset by 23 frames; in essence\, they are pulling from the “memory” of the video\, and placed side by side\, they become stitched together to form what appears to be a panoramic view. The perceived elongation of the image is achieved through a repeated temporal and spatial displacement. \n\n\n\nMedia Links:– https://shomitbarua.com/entrainment718 – https://shomitbarua.com/– IG@shomijah \n\n\n\nArtist Statement \n\n\n\nShomit Barua is a Japanese-born\, Desi-American intermedia artist specializing inecoacoustics\, responsive environments\, and emergent narratives. His work is rootedin poetry and architecture\, and reflects the shared tenets of contained space\,economy of materials\, and movement that is both physical and emotional.Combining everyday technologies with esoteric programming languages\, he blursthe line between installation and performance\, weaving together object\, sound andimage. Digital and analog techniques are fused to investigate his core subject:corporeal presence in a physical space.  \n\n\n\nHaving collaborated with sculptors\, dancers\, musicians\, architects\, and visualartists\, he believes that exploration of a motif is amplified – made “robust” and“thick” – through dialogue between disciplines. He holds an MFA in Poetry fromBennington College and teaches writing at Arizona State University whilecompleting his doctoral research at ASU’s School of Arts\, Media\, and Engineering. \n\n\n\nEntrainment – on display at Emerson Contemporary’s Media Art Gallery from June 11th – 14th.
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/entrainment-2023-ongoing-by-shomit-barua/
LOCATION:Emerson Media Art Gallery\, 25 Avery Street\, Boston\, Massachusetts\, 02111\, United States
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Exhibition
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2025/06/sb.Entrainment-1-1-scaled.jpeg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20250611T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20250614T235959
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20250606T140142Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250607T173619Z
UID:10000107-1749600000-1749945599@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:Curiosity\, Play\, Innovation: International Computer Music Conference Installations at Emerson
DESCRIPTION:Emerson Contemporary has joined hands with the International Computer Music Conference (ICMC)\, one of the world’s largest and most prestigious gatherings of sound artists\, electroacoustic composers\, and music technologists from across the globe.  \n\n\n\nThis year\, the installation track of ICMC 2025 received 56 submissions from artists and researchers across 12 countries\, showcasing the expanding boundaries of sound art and interactive media. These installations will be on display at Emerson Contemporary’s Media Art Gallery from June 11th – 14th. \n\n\n\nRings…Through Rings by Tak Cheung Hai \n\n\n\nIn alignment with this year’s theme of “Curiosity\, Play\, Innovation\,” we accepted 19 installations that transform Emerson College’s Media Art Gallery and Bright Family Screening Room into laboratories of sonic exploration. The selected works span a rich spectrum of approaches—from immersive audiovisual environments and interactive sound sculptures to spatial audio experiences and video installations—each pushing the envelope of how we experience and interact with sound in physical space.  \n\n\n\nParticularly noteworthy is the diversity of artistic practices represented\, with creators employing everything from AI-driven systems and sensor-based interactions to acoustic phenomena and architectural resonances. Many works exemplify the democratization of technology that David Wessel championed\, utilizing accessible tools and gallery-provided equipment to ensure that innovative artistic expression isn’t limited by resource constraints.  These installations invite participants to move beyond traditional concert hall experiences and engage with sound as a sculptural\, architectural\, and deeply interactive medium\, and feature work by Michael Trommer\, Jane Tingley\, Zhitao Lin\, William Turner Duffin\, Tak Cheung Hui\, Matthew Ostrowski\, Matthew Azevedo\, Shomit Barua\, Betsey Biggs. \n\n\n\nRead more about the ICMC schedule of installations and screenings right here\, or about the installations at the Emerson Contemporary Gallery below.  \n\n\n\nForesta-Inclusive: (ex)tending towards by Jane Tingley\n\n\n\nContained by Michael Trommer \n\n\n\nContained presents a sonic auscultation of our Anthropocentric milieu\, integratingfield recordings\, 360o camera footage and 3D scans of urban corporate towers\,logistical networks\, industrial areas and other non-places [1] as well as urbanencampments and derelict locales that are resonant with both the heard andunheard acoustic emanations of the technotope we have become dependent uponfor our survival. In doing so\, it approaches sound as a material that can beapprehended as both corporeal and abstracted: in addition to the airborne\, audiblesound of the subject spaces\, Contained integrates the electrical\, vibrational andmnemonic emissions that permeate our everyday habitats\, highlighting their rolesas unheeded yet nonetheless deeply affective components of a quotidian andcontingent soundscape. \n\n\n\nContained – Project Still\n\n\n\nMichael Trommer is a Toronto-based sound and video artist; his practice has beenfocused primarily on psychogeographical and acoustemological explorations ofanthropocentric space via the use of spatial and tactile sound\, field recordings\,VR\, immersive installation and expanded cinema. \n\n\n\nEntrainment by Shomit Barua \n\n\n\nEntrainment is part of a series of phenomenological experiments that explore thetheme of spatial and temporal disorientation. Inspired by the passing landscapeviewed from subways and trains\, this audio-video installation employs severalmotion-based perceptual distortions: 1) the Doppler effect\, 2) Moiré interferencepatterns\, 3) skewed parallax (binocular disparity)\, and 4) the Wagon wheel effect.Entrainment refers to the synchronization of organisms to an external perceivedrhythm. \n\n\n\nEntrainment at SMOCA – Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (2024-2025)\n\n\n\nShomit Barua is a Japanese-born\, Desi-American intermedia artist specializing inecoacoustics\, responsive environments\, and emergent narratives. His work is rootedin poetry and architecture\, and reflects the shared tenets of contained space\,economy of materials\, and movement that is both physical and emotional.Combining everyday technologies with esoteric programming languages\, he blursthe line between installation and performance\, weaving together object\, sound andimage. Digital and analog techniques are fused to investigate his core subject:corporeal presence in a physical space. \n\n\n\nForesta-Inclusive: (ex)tending towards by Jane Tingley\n\n\n\n(ex)tending towards is driven by sensor data collected using the Foresta-Inclusiveinfrastructure at the rare Charitable Reserve in Blaire\, ON. CA. This infrastructureincludes three networked ecosensors that are installed unobtrusively onto the trunk of atree and sense phenomenon such as: temperature\, humidity\, VOCs\, particulate matter\,wind\, C02 and rain. The in-gallery installation is composed of three main components: 1)a visualization that images 24hrs of collected data\, where the outer ring showscontemporary values and each subsequent smaller ring images the values from theprevious hour\, 2) a point cloud of the tree being sensed\, and 3) the soundscape thatsonifies the collected data. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nJane Tingley is an artist\, curator\, director of the SLOlab (Systems | Life | Ontologies) andAssociate Professor at York University. Her studio work combines traditional studiopractice with new media tools – and spans responsive/interactive installation\,performative robotics\, and telematically connected distributed sculptures/installations. \n\n\n\nthe ground beneath our feet\, the air inside our lungs by Matthew Azevedo\n\n\n\nthe ground beneath our feet\, the air inside our lungs explores the deep\, inviolableconnections between seemingly independent individuals. Visitors are invited to sitin cocoon-like hammock chairs where they will experience an infrasonicgenerative composition presented via tactile transducers built into the chair’sframe. The composition’s development is primarily directed by the visitor’s heartand respiratory rate\, which are monitored via a millimeter-wave radar sensor.While in this seemingly isolated state\, the visitor’s experience is continuouslyshaped by the sensor data from nearby hammocks and activity throughout thespace monitored by a seismic accelerometer mounted to the floor. \n\n\n\nDetail view of one of the “haptic hammock’s” two Dayton Audio TT25-8 tactile transducers.\n\n\n\nM. Azevedo (b. 1977) is an artist\, educator\, and researcher based in Providence\,RI whose work is focused on the outer edges of human perception\, in particularthe liminal space between touch and hearing occupied by infrasound. They aremost widely known for their recorded works and international performances asRetribution Body\, composing site-specific works for architectural spaces driveninto resonance by massive custom subwoofers. \n\n\n\nLiminal by Zhitao Lin\n\n\n\nLiminal is an AI-driven audiovisual installation by Zhitao Lin that transforms tra-ditional Chinese aesthetics into a generative\, interactive experience. Inspired by the mythical Peach Blossom Spring\, the piece uses real-time gesture tracking to control the sound of Guqin\, Xiao\, and percussion\, along with dynamic digital ink landscapes rendered as 3D particle systems. Only one audience member is tracked at a time\, allowing for a focused and intimate interaction. Each motion becomes a brushstroke in both sound and image\, creating a deeply personal and ephemeral version of this imagined utopia. \n\n\n\nA Generated visual output from Liminal\, illustrating gesture-driven 3D particle ink landscape.Image by Zhitao Lin.\n\n\n\nZhitao Lin is a forward-thinking composer whose work bridges traditional Chineseaesthetics\, spectral music\, and cutting-edge technology. Currently a Doctor ofMusical Arts (DMA) candidate in Composition at the Peabody Institute of the JohnsHopkins University\, he also holds a Master’s degree in Composition from Peabodyand a Bachelor’s degree in Music from the University of California\, Berkeley. Hisresearch focuses on the intersection of artificial intelligence and musiccomposition\, exploring new possibilities in sound art through deep technologicalintegration. \n\n\n\nMELT: the memory of ice by Betsey Biggs\n\n\n\nMELT: the memory of ice (topographic remix) is a spatial remix of my music-film MELT: thememory of ice\, an invitation to sit bedside in communion with our earth’s body melting andspilling through climate change. Created during a summer spent in Greenland with my mother and 5-year-old\, the installation creates a spectacular\, otherworldly\, immersive river of icebergs\, increasingly interrupted by flashes of memories of the north. A musical drone rich with glimmers of sound — calving ice\, reindeer bells\, sled dogs — surrounds a choir reciting an unfathomable list of winter’s loss — flurries\, orca\, snow angels. The transformation and relocation of the film’s sounds and images opens up a new\, imaginative space for the audience to sit with and wander through\, a kind of inner topography of the north. The ice melts on. \n\n\n\nStill\, MELT: the memory of ice (topographic remix)\, 2024\n\n\n\nBetsey Biggs (Writer/Director/Composer) is a composer and media artist whose workconnects the dots between sound\, image\, place and technology. Her work has been described by the New Yorker as “psychologically complex\, exposing how we orient ourselves with our ears.” For more than twenty-five years\, she has composed music\, created live multimedia performances\, and created participatory art installations. \n\n\n\nRings…Through Rings by Tak Cheung Hui and Xiaoqiao Li\n\n\n\nRings. . . Through Rings transforms historical military cartography of Hong Kong into an immersive sound installation\, where laser-etched vinyl discs—each encoding geographical data—are physically manipulated by participants. These custom turntable-based artifacts translate map engravings into sonic textures\, generating evolving soundscapes thatreflect the landscape’s temporal shifts. Through real-time audiovisual processing\, users explore the dynamic interplay between natural topographies\, human intervention\, and technological mediation\, experiencing history through physical engagement and spatial listening. \n\n\n\nLaser-etched vinyl disc on a turntable\, showcasing processed cartographic engravings of Hong Kong’s Northern Metropolis.\n\n\n\nHUI Tak-Cheung\, a Hong Kong-born composer\, creates works spanning chamber and orchestral music\, electronic pieces\, sound installations\, and interdisciplinary projects. His multidisciplinary approach integrates immersive audio\, spatial sound\, and advanced music technologies to reconstruct soundscapes and tell stories across eras and cultures. \n\n\n\nXiaoqiao Li is an artist\, academic\, and researcher whose work examines the intersection of analogue imprints and digital imprints\, particularly in analysing digital print matrices. Li’s practice-based approach sheds light on the complexities of printmaking in the digital era by investigating how digital imaging information is captured\, retained\, lost\, and transmitted. Li holds a BA in Visual Arts from Macao Polytechnic University\, an MA in Visual Arts: Printmaking from Camberwell College of Arts\, University of the Arts London\, and a PhD from the Academy of Visual Arts\, Hong Kong Baptist University\, supported by the Hong Kong PhD Fellowship Scheme. His PhD thesis was selected by the Leonardo Graduate Abstracts (LGA) Peer Review Committee as a top-rated LABS Abstract for advanced research in Art and Science\, published by Leonardo (MIT Press Journals). Li’s work has been exhibited internationally\, earning accolades such as the Clifford Chance Purchase Prize (UK) and the Chinese Young Artists’ Work Award at the Beijing International Art Biennale. Beyond his studio practice\, Li actively contributes to academia through presentations at conferences and articles published in the IMPACT Printmaking Journal and Leonardo (MIT Press)\, fostering dialogue among artists and scholars in both traditional printmaking and digital art. As he continues to learn and grow\, Li hopes that his continuous efforts will contribute to evolving discussions in the field. \n\n\n\nSummerland by Matthew Ostrowski\n\n\n\nSummerland explores the intersection of the technical and the mystical at thedawn of the electrical age. Morse code sounders are driven by texts from fromtwo critical figures in early long-distance communication: Samuel Morse himself\,the telegraph’s inventor\, and Spiritualist medium Kate Fox\, who communicatedwith the dead through a ‘spiritual telegraph.’ Excerpts from Morse’s writings aretranslated into the code that bears his name\, and 21st-century analysis/synthesistechniques are used in a futile attempt to resynthesize recorded transcripts ofFox’s sessions with the beyond using 19th-century means. \n\n\n\nSummerland at the Albany Institute\, 2020 (detail). Photo by Andrew Neumann.\n\n\n\nA New York City native\, Matthew Ostrowski is a composer\, performer\, and installation artist. Using digital tools and formalist techniques to engage with quotidian materials: sonic\, physical\, and cultural; Ostrowski explores the liminal space between the virtual and phenomenological worlds. Engaged with tropes of interruption and flux\, his works function as environments in a constant state of change\, exploring the process of consciousness in its constant state of collision with the world.
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/curiosity-play-innovation-international-computer-music-conference-installations-at-emerson/
LOCATION:Emerson Media Art Gallery\, 25 Avery Street\, Boston\, Massachusetts\, 02111\, United States
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Exhibition
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-06-at-9.58.11-AM.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20241202T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20241205T235959
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20241127T141315Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250214T194417Z
UID:10000091-1733097600-1733443199@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:The M.F.A Thesis Shows: Christopher Lee & Asma Khoshmehr
DESCRIPTION:Emerson’s Master’s in Fine Arts candidates\, Christopher Lee and Asma Khoshmehr share deeply personal stories of their family’s past\, interpreted through new media.  \n\n\n\nThis exhibition will have a reception on December 5th from 6-8pm. \n\n\n\nMemory Lost by Christopher Lee\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nMemory Lost is a multimedia installation that probes the fragile nature of human memory through the lens of AI generated media. Drawing inspiration from the artist’s personal experience witnessing his grandfather’s battle with Alzheimer’s Disease\, this work explores the parallels between artificial intelligence and human cognition. The installation revisits formative moments from the artist’s life from childhood through adulthood\, using AI to reconstruct and reinterpret these memories.  \n\n\n\nBy highlighting the biases and limitations of both AI and human recollection\, the piece invites viewers to contemplate the ephemeral quality of our lived experiences. Memory Lost serves as a poignant meditation on mortality\, loss\, and the imperfect mechanisms through which we preserve and recall our past\, challenging us to consider the essence of what makes us human. \n\n\n\nThroughout his artistic journey\, Chris has been driven by an innate curiosity to acquire new knowledge\, leading him to constantly push the boundaries of his creative toolkit. Early in life he explored drawing and painting before developing a deep affinity for music. By high school Chris had built up a home studio filled with guitars\, synthesizers\, and other gadgets. As an adult\, Chris briefly explored a business career before realizing his true calling lay in creative work.  \n\n\n\nHe enrolled in Emerson College’s Film & Media Art program to work with other artists and to find a personal and professional outlet for his creativity. Since then\, Chris has contributed to dozens of student and independent projects\, specializing in location sound recording\, sound design\, and mixing. His personal work leverages diverse digital technologies\, reflecting his evolution from a young artist to a versatile multimedia professional adept at integrating multiple artistic disciplines. \n\n\n\nAct.No.06: 1001 Nights in Zanzibar by Asma Khoshmehr\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nAct.No.06: 1001 Nights in Zanzibar is a multimedia installation that uncovers the silenced stories of forced child marriages and political persecution following the Zanzibar Revolution of 1964. The work explores a 1971 presidential decree that allowed officials to forcibly marry underage girls\, including many women in the artist’s family. These policies led to deportation\, imprisonment\, confiscation of family properties\, and decades of silence about the trauma endured. Asma\, the first in her generation to uncover this hidden history\, conducted years of research\, discovering the secret stories of many women in her family impacted by these events. She traveled across Tanzania\, Kenya\, Oman\, UAE\, and Iran to gather testimonies\, family documents\, and archival records\, piecing together her family’s survival through forced marriages\, captivity\, and eventual escape.Inspired by One Thousand and One Nights and Scheherazade’s storytelling to transform a vengeful king into a compassionate leader\, Asma’s project reflects her hope to mirror Scheherazade’s journey. It combines archival materials\, 3D laser scans\, virtual reality experiences\, and video art\, exploring how storytelling can confront power and inspire transformation. By sharing these stories\, this project reflects on how Scheherazade used storytelling to change a vengeful king\, drawing attention to the tyrants of today who continue to use women’s bodies as tools of revenge in war and revolution.Asma Khoshmehr is an interdisciplinary artist and filmmaker whose work combines immersive storytelling\, documentary filmmaking\, and new media. With a BFA in Performing Arts and currently pursuing an MFA with a focus on new media\, her practice draws deeply from her East African and Middle Eastern heritage\, exploring themes of generational trauma\, forced displacement\, and political sexual violence.   \n\n\n\nAsma’s work has earned recognition through prestigious awards and residencies\, including the MacDowell Fellowship\, the MASS MoCA\, Andrew Freedman Home (AFH)\, and the ON::VIEW Artist Residency. She has also received the Carole Fielding Grant from the University Film and Video Association (UFVA) and the Virgin Unite Grant. Her international journey includes a scholarship to study Beijing Opera at the Shanghai Theater Academy and mythology at Sanskriti Kendra in India.
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/the-m-f-a-thesis-shows-christopher-lee-asma-khoshmehr/
LOCATION:Huret And Spector Gallery\, Tufte Building
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Exhibition,Performance,Reception,Student Projects
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20241022T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20241214T235959
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20240527T170355Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250214T194502Z
UID:10000082-1729555200-1734220799@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:Louis Cameron: NOW IS THE TIME
DESCRIPTION:Emerson Contemporary Presents: Billboards\, posters and text-based works in “Louis Cameron: Now Is the Time” Exhibition explores the civil rights movement\, gun violence\, and hip hop culture. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nEmerson Contemporary proudly presents Louis Cameron: Now is the Time\, featuring billboards\, posters and text-based works that explore the civil rights movement\, gun violence and hip hop culture. It is underway\, on view through December 14\, 2024 at Emerson College’s Media Art Gallery in the heart of downtown Boston.  \n\n\n\nThe free exhibition features several large-scale\, wall-mounted vinyl text pieces from the ongoing Hip Hop Onomatopoeia series\, a body of work that explores the conversation on gun violence within hip hop music. The works are text based\, using the onomatopoeia of gun shots in hip hop songs as their reference. Cameron focuses on onomatopoeia because of its emotional resonance. Additional works from the Excavation and Displacement series are also on view. \n\n\n\nExclusively for this exhibition\, Cameron designed a limited-edition take home poster titled \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nI Got To Have It\, serving as a monument to Hip Hop culture and black music in Boston. It features a poem that peels back the layers of a song to reveal its connections to the history of Black music. Indicative of Hip Hop’s sampling culture\, the poem is composed of a source song and the song titles that it sampled from.  \n\n\n\nNotably\, these sampled songs touch on key points in the lineage of Black music such as James Brown\, the Blues\, and spirituals. The poster addresses urban realities and gun violence\, the self-determination of the Black Power movement of the late 1960s\, and features the title of a song that refers to the African American spirituals such as Wade in the Water. The choice of typeface provides a reference to Hip Hop culture for the presentation of the poem. \n\n\n\nAdditionally\, Cameron will present the “I AM… Portfolio” a group of posters addressing the recent violence against Black men and disregard for their lives in America. The title refers to rally calls and protest chants from the 1960s to the present. While violence against Black people is center stage in the current American cultural conversation\, presenting a project by Black male artists – including Sanford Biggers\, Rashid Johnson\, and Shaun Leonardo\, among others – offers valuable insights and counter representation. \n\n\n\nLouis Cameron was born in Xxxxxxxx\, Ohio\, USA; lives and works in Berlin\, Germany.  He earned a B.F.A. from the University of Southern California in Los Angeles\, and an M.F.A. from Tyler School of Art\, Temple University in Philadelphia.https://www.louiscameron.com/
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/louis-cameron-this-is-america/
LOCATION:Media Art Gallery\, 25 Avery Street\, Boston\, Massachusetts\, 02111
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Exhibition,Public Program
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2024/05/Screenshot-2024-05-27-at-12.59.27-PM.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20240927T140000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20240927T153000
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20240905T232802Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240925T191953Z
UID:10000088-1727445600-1727451000@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:A "Give it Back" Workshop With New Red Order (NRO)
DESCRIPTION:Give it Back Workshop \n\n\n\nNew Red Order (NRO) will unpack their “Give it Back Program” which recruits\, normalizes\, and promotes the ongoing practice of voluntary land return from settlers back to Indigenous peoples through a multiplicity of swerving artistic and political strategies including: advertising\, network creation\, promotional videos\, public art\, performance and organizing. NRO will work with students to help devise strategies for how their own work can expand past the limitations of art and into the world to create material changeNew Red Order will be conducting the workshop on September 27th\, from 2:00 – 3:30 pm at Student Performance Center\, Little Building\, 80 Boylston St. RSVP your spot at the workshop right here.**RSVP required for non-Emerson guests \n\n\n\nNew Red Order’s large-scale video installation Culture Capture: Crimes Against Reality examines the contradictions inherent in a society built on both the longing for indigeneity and the violent erasure of Indigenous peoples. They base their critique on historical events\, and the pacing of the digitized imagery\, accompanied by skillful sound design\, transports viewers into their speculative reveries. 
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/artist-talk-new-red-order/
LOCATION:Student Performance Center\, Little Building\, 80 Boylston Street\, Boston\, Massachusetts\, 02116\, United States
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Artist Talk,Exhibition,Public Program
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2024/09/New-Red-Order-Work.jpeg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20240926T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20240926T193000
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20240905T233044Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240911T150704Z
UID:10000089-1727373600-1727379000@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:How to Commit Crimes Against Reality: ARTIST TALK with New Red Order
DESCRIPTION: *Doors open at 5:30pm \n\n\n\n“Do you want to realize your fullest potential? Be your truest self? Act with confidence? Attract abundance? Alleviate anxiety? Experience clarity? Know your purpose? Be the change you want to see? Be truly present? Experience real freedom? Change the world? Be a part of the solution? On some level\, we all want to feel this way\, but sometimes in our globalized\, capitalist\, settler-colonial society it feels impossible. Which is why the New Red Order is developing a dynamic system to help our accomplices achieve all of this and more. This sneak peek of our free introductory video\, Never Settle\, will tell you what you need to know to take control of your life today!” \n\n\n\nAs a part of New Red Order’s work in Emerson Contemporary’s off the pedestal multimedia installation\, the artist group will be conducting a workshop on September 27th\, from 2-3:30 pm at Emerson’s Media Art Gallery. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNew Red Order’s large-scale video installation Culture Capture: Crimes Against Reality examines the contradictions inherent in a society built on both the longing for indigeneity and the violent erasure of Indigenous peoples. They base their critique on historical events\, and the pacing of the digitized imagery\, accompanied by skillful sound design\, transports viewers into their speculative reveries. 
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/new-red-orders-culture-capture-crimes-against-reality-workshop/
LOCATION:Media Art Gallery\, 25 Avery Street\, Boston\, Massachusetts\, 02111\, United States
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Exhibition,Public Program,Workshop
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2024/09/NRO-talk-image.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20240918T170000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20240918T180000
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20240905T232310Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240905T232828Z
UID:10000087-1726678800-1726682400@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:Artist Talk: Laura Anderson Barbata
DESCRIPTION:As a part of Laura Anderson Barbata’s work in Emerson Contemporary’s off the pedestal multimedia installation\, the artist will be giving a talk at the Media Art Gallery on September 18th\, from 5:00-6:00pm (doors open at 4:30 pm). \n\n\n\nBarbata’s inspiring performance work Indigo is a call to action in response to the violence and murder of Black persons at the hands of the police. A group of sixteen resplendent characters clad in hand-dyed fabrics\, woven details\, and ornate stitching\, many standing at the height of stilts\, powerfully demonstrate the textile art aspect of Barbata’s vision. Come celebrate off the pedestal\, a multimedia group exhibition featuring visual artists Laura Anderson Barbata\, New Red Order\, and Paula J. Wilson. This exhibition is on view in the Media Art Gallery at 25 Avery Street from August 1 – October 5\, 2024. The exhibition is free and open to the public Tuesday – Saturday\, 12-6 pm.  \n\n\n\nLaura Anderson Barbata\, Indigo\, 2017\n\n\n\nCurated by Distinguished Curator-in-Residence Leonie Bradbury and Curator of Special Projects Shana Dumont Garr\, off the pedestal speaks directly to the national phenomenon of the removal of Confederate and other racist monuments in the wake of the police murder of George Floyd. Although monuments are generally presented as permanent\, timeless\, and expressive of universal values\, this exhibition proposes that public memory could be more effectively addressed and activated through ephemeral expressions. \n\n\n\n \n\n\n\nNew Red Order’s large-scale video installation Culture Capture: Crimes Against Reality examines the contradictions inherent in a society built on both the longing for indigeneity and the violent erasure of Indigenous peoples. They base their critique on historical events\, and the pacing of the digitized imagery\, accompanied by skillful sound design\, transports viewers into their speculative reveries.  \n\n\n\nPaula J. Wilson’s performative video Living Monument and 2D wall work Thyself monumentalize Black female bodies through dramatic scale and bold gestures. Her work elevates embodied histories and reminds us that joy and celebration are crucial parts of resistance. This exhibition is part of Emerson Contemporary’s Regarding Monuments: Visualizing Hidden Histories\, a multi-year initiative that includes exhibitions centered on monuments\, several public art installations\, and a technology incubator.
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/artist-talk-laura-anderson-barbata/
LOCATION:Media Art Gallery
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Artist Talk,Exhibition,Public Program
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2024/09/2024_Barbata_Web_900x600-768x512-1.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20240909T120000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20241130T190000
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20240527T165315Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250214T194355Z
UID:10000081-1725883200-1732993200@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:I have asked myself: "Can a sentence be haunted? And if so\, by what?"
DESCRIPTION:By Kameelah Janan Rasheed  \n\n\n\n\n\nEmerson Contemporary has commissioned a public art campaign by Kameelah Jana Rasheed where she responds to Boston’s memorial landscape exploring the layered histories of the Boston Common. Rasheed will expand her textual practice by animating the typographical history of this region to create a library of typefaces – fragments (letters\, textures) of language. These fragments will be interwoven or sampled into digital designs and animated poems and displayed on digital signage situated around Emerson’s campus.  \n\n\n\nKameelah Rasheed\n\n\n\nRasheed studies\, documents\, annotates\, and creates texts. Beyond the content\, she is interested in the materiality of text and language across different substrates (or compositional fields)\, or how text shows up across geological features\, physical architecture\, and in printed matter.
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/i-have-asked-myself-can-a-sentence-be-haunted-and-if-so-by-what/
LOCATION:Boston Commons\, 139 Tremont St\, Boston\, MA\, Boston\, 02111\, United States
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Exhibition,Regarding Monuments: Visualizing Hidden Histories
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2024/01/BioPhoto1.jpeg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20240801T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20241005T235959
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20240527T164628Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250328T155142Z
UID:10000080-1722470400-1728172799@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:off the pedestal
DESCRIPTION:off the pedestal is a group exhibition in the Media Art Gallery\, comprising contemporary artists whose work addresses the national conversation around monuments featuring visual artists Laura Anderson Barbata\, New Red Order\, and Paula J. Wilson.  \n\n\n\nView exhibition documentation. \n\n\n\nThis exhibition is on view in the Media Art Gallery at 25 Avery Street from August 1 – October 5\, 2024. The exhibition is free and open to the public Tuesday – Saturday\, 12-6 pm. This exhibition is part of Emerson Contemporary’s Regarding Monuments: Visualizing Hidden Histories\, a multi-year initiative that includes exhibitions centered on monuments\, several public art installations\, and a technology incubator.  \n\n\n\nCurated by Distinguished Curator-in-Residence Leonie Bradbury and Curator of Special Projects Shana Dumont Garr\, off the pedestal speaks directly to the national phenomenon of the removal of Confederate and other racist monuments in the wake of the police murder of George Floyd. Although monuments are generally presented as permanent\, timeless\, and expressive of universal values\, this exhibition proposes that public memory could be more effectively addressed and activated through ephemeral expressions.  \n\n\n\noff the pedestal is supported by the City of Boston Mayor’s Office of Arts & Culture (MOAC) program “Un-monument | Re-monument | De-monument: Transforming Boston.” It is a city-wide initiative that aims to transform the nation’s commemorative landscape to ensure collective histories are more completely and accurately represented.   \n\n\n\noff the pedestal is further supported by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts  \n\n\n\nLaura Anderson Barbata’s multidisciplinary performance work Indigo is a call to action in response to the violence and murder of Black persons at the hands of the police. A group of sixteen resplendent characters clad in hand-dyed fabrics\, woven details\, and ornate stitching\, many standing at the height of stilts\, powerfully demonstrate the textile art aspect of Barbata’s vision.  \n\n\n\nNew Red Order’s large-scale video installation Culture Capture: Crimes Against Reality examines the contradictions inherent in a society built on both the longing for indigeneity and the violent erasure of Indigenous peoples. They base their critique on historical events\, and the pacing of the digitized imagery\, accompanied by skillful sound design\, transports viewers into their speculative reveries.  \n\n\n\nPaula J. Wilson’s performative video Living Monument and 2D wall work Thyself monumentalize Black female bodies through dramatic scale and bold gestures. Her work elevates embodied histories and reminds us that joy and celebration are crucial parts of resistance. \n\n\n\nWorks featured in this exhibition include: \n\n\n\nNew Red Order\, Culture Capture: Crimes Against Reality\, HD video (video still)\, 2020\n\n\n\nA two-channel video Culture Capture: Crimes Against Reality by New Red Order (NRO)\, a public secret society that works with networks of informants and accomplices to create grounds for Indigenous futures. Crimes Against Reality focuses on two public sculptures by James Earle Fraser — End of the Trail (1894)\, a statue originally intended to be installed on the California coast at the scale of the Statue of Liberty\, and the statue of Theodore Roosevelt (1939) that was removed from outside the American Museum of Natural History\, in New York\, in 2022 — both of which commemorate the origin myth of America. \n\n\n\nLittle Jaguar (Laura Anderson Barbata) and Diablos (Jarana Beat). Intervention: Indigo\, Bushwick\, 2015. Photo: Rene Cervantes\n\n\n\n\n\nLaura Anderson Barbata Intervention: Indigo presents a call to action to serve and protect in response to police violence. The point of departure is the color Indigo\, a dye used around the globe that has been associated with protection\, wisdom and royalty.  Created in in collaboration with the Brooklyn Jumbies\, Chris Walker and Jarana Beat\, Indigo was performed first in Brooklyn and again in Mexico City in 2020 in collaboration with muca Roma\, Chris Walker\, Los Diablos de la Costa de Guerrero Los Rebeldes de El Capricho\, Elizabeth Ross\, Danza UNAM and Pro-Alterne Teatro. The work is a call to action to serve and protect\, and of protest in response to the violence and murder at the hands of the police of Black people living in the United States and all over the world.  \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPaula J. Wilson fuses wide-ranging techniques and media with her observations of the natural world\, where it is a matter of survival to make space for oneself to live\, love\, and make art. Recurring themes of feminine power\, natural life systems\, and art-making itself converge under the umbrella of regeneration and change. Narrative artworks that place feminine subjects in positions of power. Her expansive practice forcefully proclaims her place in the (art) histories she engages.
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/off-the-pedestal-art-in-protest/
LOCATION:Media Art Gallery\, 25 Avery Street\, Boston\, Massachusetts\, 02111
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Artist Talk,Exhibition,Performance,Public Program,Regarding Monuments: Visualizing Hidden Histories
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2024/05/20150913_IndigioIntervention-NK_1195-1.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20240123T170000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20240323T190000
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20240118T012419Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240118T012421Z
UID:10000072-1706029200-1711220400@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:Kameelah Janan Rasheed
DESCRIPTION:Emerson Contemporary proudly presents our upcoming artist-in-residence\, Kameelah Janan Rasheed. \n\n\n\nall velvet sentences as manifesto\, Like a lesson against smooth language oran invitation to be feral hypertext\, a multimedia solo exhibition featuring the visual artist is on view in the Media Art Gallery at 25 Avery Street from January 23 – March 23\, 2024. Exhibition hours are Tuesday – Saturday\, 12-6pm. \n\n\n\nRasheed thinks conceptually about text\, type\, and printed matter and uses publishing as a platform to engage and enlarge conversations with others. Her work invites important questions about the materiality of text\, such as\, “What is the shape of a failed sentence?” or even to quote Fred Moten speaking to the work of Renee Gladman\, “Is there an underground railroad in the sentence?” These questions are central to the artist’s practice. \n\n\n\nChristopher Gregory for The New York Times\n\n\n\nA learner\, Kameelah Janan Rasheed explores writing practices across all species\,states of living\, states of consciousness\, and substrates. Curious about the poetics and \n\n\n\npossibilities of loss\, ruin\, and failure in the reading and writing process\, Rasheedexplores Black knowledge production and fugitivity. She creates sprawling\,“architecturally-scaled” installations; public installations; publications; prints;performances; performance scores; poems; video; and other forms yet to bedetermined. Most recently\, she is a recipient of a 2023 Working Artist Fellowship; a2022 Schering Stiftung Award for Artistic Research; a 2022 Creative Capital Award; a2022 Artists + Machine Intelligence Grants – Experiments with Google; and a 2021Guggenheim Fellowship in Fine Arts.Her recent solo exhibitions include KW Institute of Contemporary Art (2023)\, Art Institute of Chicago (2023)\, and Kunstverein Hannover (2022). In 2024\, she will have a solo exhibition at REDCAT (Los Angeles\, CA). Rasheed is the author of five artists’ books:in the coherence\, we weep (KW Institute\, 2023); i am not done yet (Mousse Publishing\,2022); An Alphabetical Accumulation of Approximate Observations (Endless Editions\,2019); No New Theories (Printed Matter\, 2019); and the digital publication Scoring theStacks (Brooklyn Public Library\, 2021). She is an adjunct instructor at the Cooper Unionand Barnard College\, a Critic at Yale School of Art\, Sculpture\, and an instructor at theSchool for Poetic Computation. Rasheed founded Orange Tangent Study\, a consultingbusiness that provides artist microgrants and supports individuals and institutions indesigning expansive and liberatory learning experiences.Rasheed is represented by NOME Gallery in Berlin\, Germany. \n\n\n\nExhibition hours are Tuesday – Saturday\, 12-6pm. 
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/kameelah-janan-rasheed/
LOCATION:Media Art Gallery\, 25 Avery Street\, Boston\, Massachusetts\, 02111
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2024/01/LucidDream_.jpeg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20231215T080000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20231216T170000
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20240214T150326Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240214T151004Z
UID:10000065-1702627200-1702746000@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:Musician Julian Saporiti approaches refugee storytelling with compassion
DESCRIPTION:By Maddie Browning \n\n\n\nBerklee alum Julian Saporiti releases music inspired by his fieldwork and research on Asian American history under the pseudonym No-No Boy – a reference to John Okada’s novel of the same name.  \n\n\n\nA selection of his songs and music videos are a part of Emerson Contemporary’s “One Day We’ll Go Home” exhibition on display through December 16.  \n\n\n\nEmerson Contemporary chatted with Saporiti on Zoom about his favorite musical artists\, collaborating on artistic projects with his wife\, and checking his privilege with the monks at Blue Cliff Monastery. \n\n\n\nEC: What artists are you inspired by? \n\n\n\nSaporiti: There’s a painting in the MFA in Boston called “Slave Ship” by [Joseph Mallord William] Turner\, and when I was in school at Berklee\, I would go see that painting a lot. It’s a really horrible subject matter\, it’s this wrecked slave ship\, so it’s all these bodies in the ocean but it’s full of [these] beautiful sunset or sunrise colors – oranges and pinks – mixed with the turbulence of the ocean. So that was always super striking\, and very similar to a lot of the work that I do\, which is dealing with stories of people crossing oceans under not so good circumstances. But that painting\, I was always entranced by that when I lived in Boston\, and I would go see that all the time.  \n\n\n\nEC: What are some of your favorite musicians? \n\n\n\nSaporiti: When I was in Boston\, as a [college student]\, I used to go to the symphony every week and the BSO because they had a student card\, so you go every Thursday for like 25 bucks a semester. I remember I saw this piece\, Hector Berlioz is the composer\, and he wrote a piece called “The Damnation of Faust\,” which is this overwhelming three choruses based on the Faust mythology\, and that’s one of my favorite pieces of music of all time. And then I also love the rock and roll or hard rock I grew up with like Rage Against the Machine and Weezer and Nirvana and all that grunge stuff. And then my dad’s record collection\, The Beatles\, Beach Boys\, Joni Mitchell\, Neil Young\, Bob Dylan.  \n\n\n\nI like all that very entrenched\, canonized stuff\, but my favorite experiences are just hearing someone in front of me play an instrument. It doesn’t even have to be a particular piece of music. It’s just like\, if there’s a clarinet player in an Italian restaurant\, I’m always drifting out of whatever conversation I’m in to hear just the sound of their instrument. I’m really appreciative of live music because there’s just something so captivating and infinite in that very small experience that you can’t get with recorded music.  \n\n\n\nEC: Your music is rooted in storytelling. How do you use different sounds to tell those stories? \n\n\n\nSaporiti: A lot of different ways. Sometimes it’s just textures of different instruments [that] might fit a lyric\, you know\, the difference between a plucked guitar with your fingers to a nice ethereal keyboard pad or something. I use a lot of samples\, and I tell a lot of stories that are based on my historic research as an academic – these histories of Asian American folks and refugees and immigrants mostly. I sample from my field research sites\, so if I go to an old refugee camp or something\, I’ll knock on the barbed wire or the wood\, and then I’ll turn that into a drum kit. So that’s what you hear on my recorded music to try to use the textures and real audible sounds of history inside the records themselves.  \n\n\n\nEmpire Electric by No-No Boy\, album cover. \n\n\n\nEC: What has your experience been like collaborating with your wife\, Emilia\, who directs and does lettering for your music videos featured in “One Day We’ll Go Home”? \n\n\n\nSaporiti: Awesome because we want to be around each other as much as possible. That’s why we got married. I have found someone who I just love sharing my life with\, and my life is so artistically driven\, it would kind of be impossible for me to be in a full time relationship with someone if they didn’t share in that and vice versa. Like right now you’ve caught me in the middle of her law school exam final week\, so I’m basically chauffeur and making all the meals and helping her study with flashcards and making sure the sleep schedule is good. So we look at everything we do as a team. And she’s a wonderful artist in her own right – a visual artist. She helps me produce the songs that I make as well. She sings when we perform live. She also has sewn this incredible stage jacket I wear in one of the videos which has hand embroidered little stories from my Vietnamese American childhood on it. \n\n\n\nEC: Tell me a little bit more about the songs you included in “One Day We’ll Go Home” and what stories you are telling. \n\n\n\nSaporiti: “Boat People” is in there and that is very central to the Vietnamese American story because I think most refugees or a good deal of us can trace their families where they directly came over as boat people. These folks who had to escape South Vietnam on these rickety little fishing boats. That song is taken directly from an archival interview of this guy who was a boat person who went to Canada. The lyrics basically tell this really cinematic story of this guy\, Dr. Tran\, who eventually made it to Montreal but he had to escape Vietnam\, got into this little fishing\, boat pirates attacked them\, eventually made it to Pulau Bidong – this refugee camp off the coast of Malaysia. It’s harrowing\, and I think that it’s really important to tell one story at a time as a teacher and also as a songwriter because it’s really hard for students or for listeners to take in a million people. You can’t understand that number\, so boiling it down to telling these personal stories detail by detail\, and then setting it to music\, I think that’s a very emotional way to speak to this larger humanity issue of refugees and immigrants and movements of people – things that are happening right now in the Middle East\, right now in Asia and Central America. This is just one person\, but if you can empathize with that one person\, then maybe you can empathize more deeply with the global issue of refugees and displacement. \n\n\n\nEC: In conducting your field work\, how do you go about talking to refugees when you’re working on new music? \n\n\n\nSaporiti: I never talk to anyone with a goal of anything. I just explore and hang out and talk to people like people\, and then if it comes up that they have an interesting story\, and they share that with me\, I might ask questions I’d ask anyone. If we’re having a drink at a bar\, I would talk to everyone the same way\, you know\, just be a good hang. That’s something they should lead off with [in] anthropology classes\, just be a good hang\, don’t needle people to relive their trauma. It’ll come out if it comes out. And if it doesn’t\, it doesn’t\, and that’s all right. That’s something I had to learn when I first started interviewing people for my No-No Boy project. I was talking to a lot of people who used to live in a Japanese internment camp in Wyoming during World War II\, and I would kind of right off the bat be like\, “Tell me about the worst three years of your life\,” which is a [expletive] up thing. Because\, as someone who comes from some really harsh family history\, you don’t want to define people by the worst parts of their life.  \n\n\n\nI’ve gone down and hung out in the Mexican camps across the border just to\, especially as a son of a refugee\, see what’s happening now and speak against it\, tell people what I’ve seen\, help out if I can. And it’s kind of up to [the refugees] what they want to share and just try to go in with a sense of reciprocity\, giving something first before you take something away from them\, which is their story.  \n\n\n\nI always bring down those Instax Polaroid cameras and just take pictures for people who have lost everything and having a picture of their kid means a lot to carry with them and then giving them the camera and a ton of film so they can take pictures of their friends. That little stuff\, that can mean a lot\, and then maybe you get some cool conversations and maybe that turns into art or songs\, but that’s really secondary.  \n\n\n\nEC: Your song “Little Monk” on [your third album] Empire Electric is inspired by your experience at Blue Cliff [Monastery]. How does that experience influence your music going forward? \n\n\n\nSaporiti: Pretty completely. My wife and I weren’t married at the time but we had started dating at Brown University. She had graduated with a sociology degree\, and I could leave campus because I was a PhD student\, and I had all my coursework done. And we just wanted to get out of there. When you’re 18 to 22\, you’re never more aware. You don’t have mortgages to pay yet or kids to worry about\, so that’s when the world really is spitting in your face the most\, and you notice it\, and you still have energy. Brown is a particularly liberal\, progressive\, activisty place\, and it was so scary to be there at that point in time\, because there were a lot of people just yelling about everything constantly and not really necessarily being informed about what they were yelling about. They were protesting everything but how rich those kids were\, never protests about economic class but everything else\, but with no substance behind it. I wanted calm in my life. I wanted the world to change. That’s why I went down to the Mexican border during a spring break to see these refugee camps for myself\, instead of just yelling about what people were yelling about on Facebook. I wanted to actually go see for myself and see if I could actually help out. \n\n\n\nThe monks will sort you out because they just don’t buy into that because there’s greater truths for them. That’s not to say they don’t acknowledge there’s pain and suffering in the world. That’s what Buddhism is about. It’s acknowledging suffering and trying to overcome it in your life. I felt like I was just angry and I felt a poison in me from all the politics in the world\, and all the suffering and [the monks] gave me tools to deal with that whether that was meditation or mindfulness stuff\, just walking around. And yeah\, that has sort of dictated my path. I don’t really use social media anymore. I’ll read the newspaper once a week instead of doom scroll constantly to see all the hell that’s happening because it’s not going to change in a week’s time. If I read one good article about the war over in the Middle East that’s going to be pretty thorough\, and I’ll catch up on what’s happened that week.  \n\n\n\nI think what I learned is to tend to your own garden. I don’t want to yell about what’s happening at a southern border if I’m being an [expletive] to my friend that week. That’s something I can help. I can help being present and helping someone else that I know and love instead of abstractly spinning out because the world is on fire. And also checking my own privilege\, right? I’m someone who has a PhD\, and makes a living doing art. I have a beautiful wife\, I have a roof over my head\, which has not always been the case in my life and\, talking about refugees\, is not the case for a lot of people now. The monks really helped me check my privilege and get out of that elite campus protester culture. They let me empty out and see that life is still wonderful for some people. For some people it’s not\, but for me\, it is\, and let me acknowledge that first and take solace and strength in that and then see how I can help the people in my community or if I do go somewhere where I can help. \n\n\n\nThis interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. 
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/musician-julian-saporiti-approaches-refugee-storytelling-with-compassion/
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Artist Talk,Gallery Talk,News
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2023/10/Screenshot-2023-10-10-at-4.13.54-PM.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20231212T080000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20231212T170000
DTSTAMP:20260502T055113
CREATED:20231212T214412Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240214T151157Z
UID:10000064-1702368000-1702400400@emersoncontemporary.org
SUMMARY:Patricia Nguyễn discusses moving through memory in performance art
DESCRIPTION:Patricia Nguyễn performs “Passage” at the Media Art Gallery.\n\n\n\nBy Maddie Browning \n\n\n\nPatricia Nguyễn is an artist\, scholar\, and educator with work surrounding the aftermath of the Vietnam War and memory\, loss\, and healing. She utilizes performance art to understand how the feeling of water and land on her body reflect the emotions and experiences of Vietnamese refugees.  \n\n\n\nHer work is a part of Emerson Contemporary’s “One Day We’ll Go Home” exhibition running through December 16. \n\n\n\nEmerson Contemporary connected with Nguyễn via Zoom to discuss her journey developing performance art\, her conversations with refugees and their families\, and what she hopes people learn from her art.  \n\n\n\nEC: When did you start developing performance art? \n\n\n\nNguyễn: I was trained in devised theater throughout elementary school\, and then in high school\, I did performance poetry and spoken word. It wasn’t until I went to Vietnam in 2010\, and I encountered state surveillance and censorship [that] it transformed my work in performance poetry and theater into performance art to think about the power of how the body can help tell the story and what the body remembers.  \n\n\n\nEC: What artists are you inspired by? \n\n\n\nNguyễn: [Okwui Okpokwasili]. She did this amazing piece called “Bronx Gothic.” A lot of the people that inspired my work are Black feminists and women of color\, feminists\, artists\, poets\, theater makers.  \n\n\n\nThe person that trained me is the first woman performance artist in Vietnam\, and her name is Ly Hoàng Ly\, who I have this lifetime performance with called “Memory vs. Memory.” She really helped me understand what performance art is and what it can do through collaborating with her. “Memory vs. Memory” began because both of our fathers were located on opposing sides of the Vietnam War. We’re their children\, their daughters\, and we inherit the memories that they’ve had to go through in particular because they’re the same age on opposing sides of the war and were both incarcerated after the end of the war – her father in an old French colonial prison\, my father in the jungles near the border of Vietnam and Cambodia. So\, for us\, delving into performance art\, delving into the cultural memory of specific objects like water or soil or metal\, conjures these memories that are linked to our own fathers’ histories of revolution and war and incarceration.  \n\n\n\nEC: You say in your artist statement that land and water are crucial to your process. I was wondering if you could tell me a little bit more about that.  \n\n\n\nNguyễn: So the word for homeland\, country\, and nation in Vietnamese is “Đất nước\,” which respectively means land and water\, but in the diaspora land drops off\, so the shorthand for saying homeland or country is “nước” or just water. So a lot of my work delves into the materiality of water itself\, like\, how does water soak into my body? How do I understand the porousness of my own skin? And how do we tap into both the internal waters that we already have and the external waters that I play with in performance when I drown myself in water\, soak my myself with drenched fabric. How does that evoke the memory both within and external to me about whatever question I’m meditating on in relationship to the aftermath of the Vietnam War?  \n\n\n\nA lot of Vietnamese were forced to migrate by boat and over water\, so a lot of them are known as boat refugees. I think about the materiality of water not just as a landscape of where forced migration happens\, but as this place of life and death. I’ve interviewed so many different Vietnamese refugees\, and all of them have said\, “I was so thirsty on that boat\, and there was water all around me and I couldn’t drink any of it.” The ocean is made up of saltwater\, and saltwater could help you if you have a sore throat – you can gargle it – but if the ratio of saltwater is too much\, it becomes toxic. So what is this line between what is healing and what is toxic? So really thinking about water\, not only as a metaphor\, but literally what does it do to the body?  \n\n\n\nAnd then land\, so my father was incarcerated on former US military bases that had landmines in them. So land was literally weaponized against the Vietnamese people\, both by the US government\, and also in the aftermath of war as people who were drafted in the south of Vietnam that were aligned with the US also were incarcerated on these very lands. The precarity of life and death is contingent on if the bomb will explode.  \n\n\n\nEC: Going back to you talking about how you have interviewed a lot of refugees\, how do you approach people that are hurting and tell their stories? \n\n\n\nNguyễn: So for refugees\, they have to prove what they’ve been through to even gain refugee status. So the process of conducting oral histories is hopefully more of a reparative act\, where it’s not just like\, “Let me extract your story to see if you qualify for this paperwork or the status for particular rights and privileges.” It’s like\, “Let me actually listen and ask you your story.” The way that I conduct oral histories\, it’s based off of a relationship that I’ve already had with people\, so either I’ve known them for quite some time\, so they can trust me with their stories\, or I’m introduced to them by someone who they already trust and that person is either in the room with me or has done a lot of the prep work to help support that person. So it’s always based in rapport and consent.  \n\n\n\nIt’s really just being as present as possible and doing deep listening and gauging what people are comfortable with and what people are not comfortable with. At the end of the interview\, I always check in with them\, making sure that they’re okay\, asking them if there’s anything else they want to share. And I ask I leave them with a hopeful question like\, “What do you hope for yourself or your children or future generations?” or “What do you want to leave us with and what do you want us to learn?” so that it’s not a line of questions that focus on trauma or pain. It’s more of a line of questions and invitations to share and understand these histories with one another. I try to help those that I’m interviewing feel empowered after the interview that their story is important and what they went through was significant and that they’re not alone. \n\n\n\nEC: You received a Fulbright Fellowship in 2010 to work in Vietnam and co-founded Cây\, “the first life skills and art therapy reintegration program for human trafficking survivors along the border regions of Vietnam\,” according to your website. Tell me more about the program and why you created it. \n\n\n\nNguyễn: So originally\, I was supposed to go to Vietnam or Cambodia to work with survivors of sex trafficking and human trafficking. But the Vietnamese and Cambodian government shut down the organization that I was going to work with a week before my application was due. Luckily\, my friend worked in Vietnam and works with an anti-human trafficking organization and brought me on to it.  \n\n\n\nI had a lot of pushback going back to Vietnam from my own family. They were like\, “We escaped from there. Why would you go back?” For me\, it was really important to see the other side of war and to see those that are still impacted by its aftermath\, even if not in the way that we understand how people are directly impacted\, but just in terms of the new neoliberal development policies and how that impacts indigenous folks who are also known as ethnic minorities. I wanted to see how development is impacting those who live in poor and rural areas\, and who are being heard and neglected by the government and to work on young women’s empowerment through the arts. So I co-founded that program with my friend who was also interested in arts education\, and we were interested in exploring how arts can be this tool to support people to express themselves and make sense of the conditions that they’re living in and feel like they can build community around that because art is the first thing that was used for the war in terms of propaganda and gaining public support\, but it’s also the thing that is most censored and most surveilled.  \n\n\n\nEC: At Emerson\, you performed “Passage” on November 14. What story were you telling through that performance? \n\n\n\nNguyễn: There was this beautiful photo that I had seen of a Vietnamese woman with her conical hat\, and she was surrounded by all these beautiful green fishing nets\, and she just loved her\, so that’s what inspired the material that I worked with. I worked with different color tulle that evoked the water itself\, and the water at different depths. I played with different colors of tulle to show the different dimensions and layers of water. In thinking about the creation of “Passage\,” when you walk through the gallery space\, you first walk into Tiffany Chung’s piece\, and her piece is really about the forced migration right after the war. And then in the middle\, you have Tuấn Andrew Nguyễn’s installation video\, “[The] Boat People” where they land on this refugee camp\, so it’s from the journey of leaving to the refugee camp\, and then my three channel installation is at the far end of the gallery\, and it’s really challenging the notion of refugee resettlement. So it’s kind of like if you move through the gallery\, that’s the story that I saw\, from departure to this liminal space of the refugee camp\, to this place of resettlement.  \n\n\n\nSo in the middle of the gallery space\, I wanted to imagine that it was all water\, and the tulle evoked that sense of water. So I started the performance in the middle of Tiffany’s installation. And part of what I did was\, I sunk into all this tulle that was surrounding me to be with the material\, meditate with her piece\, and have it be infused into my performance work. And then I carry the tulle into the main gallery space\, and part of carrying the tulle is imagining\, “What does it mean to literally try to carry water?” And it’s spilling over\, it cannot be contained in any way. Then I dive into the tulle\, and I’m wrestling in the midst of it\, trying to explore my breath\, trying to explore tension\, trying to explore moments of feeling like I’m swimming or floating or drowning or shifting and just thinking about what the space could be. And meanwhile what’s being projected onto me from the projector above are these incremental numbers that are going up and down in different ways to symbolize the number of growing refugees that are left to die at sea or abandoned by nation states or government.  \n\n\n\nSo that’s being projected on my body as I’m moving under and with and through the tulle and exploring expansion and contraction and breath and thinking about the bodies that were forced to migrate by sea and those that drowned or were thrown overboard or couldn’t make it. What does it mean to dive deep into the ocean where these bodies have landed? So then I struggle to get out of the tulle and go back in because the answer isn’t resettlement. The answer isn’t\, “Let me arrive at some place\, and it’ll save me. Let me get out of the water.” It was really thinking about\, “Let’s return to the water\,” and “What can the water teach us\, and how can we build other worlds and imaginaries through the water?” And then I worked with Fiona Fiona Ngô who created a really beautiful experimental sound piece that really framed the performance and was a call in response to the piece. \n\n\n\nEC: Your Paul and Daisy Soros Fellow for New Americans bio states that growing up your parents told you stories about their experience escaping Vietnam during the war as boat refugees to Malaysia and Indonesia and resettling in the United States in the ‘80s. How do those stories inform your work? \n\n\n\nNguyễn: They deeply inform my work in that they are the ones that I’m theorizing with. They helped me understand the political stakes of war in how they’ve survived and how they don’t want that to happen to anyone else in any capacity. So I draw on their stories to create my performance gestures\, and I draw on their stories and their legacies to think about\, “What is the purpose of this work?” and really thinking about how it’s to connect with audiences to share these histories and these stories. That’s how they want their stories to be passed on. \n\n\n\nEC: What do you hope people learn from experience in your art? \n\n\n\nNguyễn: I hope it offers a space for people to grieve and to mourn\, especially as we’re witnessing different levels of violence all the time. I want people to understand that war and the process of nation building always results in forced migration\, always results in the predetermination of who gets to live and who gets to die or who has to die for someone else to live. I want people to learn the human stakes of what it means to delve into these histories\, not only just as something that’s happened in the past\, but as a lens to think about the future\, as a way to think about how we can build a better world by not forgetting and erasing the violences and the ugly histories and the heartbreaks of the past. How do we acknowledge them and also transform them so that we can build a better world\, a better future for all of us and other generations to come? \n\n\n\nThis interview was edited and condensed for clarity.
URL:https://emersoncontemporary.org/event/patricia-nguyen-discusses-moving-through-memory-in-performance-art/
CATEGORIES:Artist Spotlight,Artist Talk,News
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://emersoncontemporary.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2023/12/IMG_6910-rotated.jpg
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR