Busy week

Lots happening lately! First, a moment to share some very nice press from both mnartists.org and the Star Tribune.

And, now that the album has dropped and the video along with it, I can share Status Update‘s appearance in this video by Duluth’s bluegrass stars Trampled By Turtles:

I have to say, as a musician focused on synthesizers and circuit bending and 8-bit glitch – if you told me anything I created would have ended up in a video premiere on Country Music Television I’d have had a hard time believing you. The song and the video are beautiful, and it’s a privilege to be a part of them.

I’ll be de-installing tonight, which is bittersweet. I feel like a broken record, but I’ll say it one more time: AoV has been a fantastic experience. But looking forward – I had a great 2nd site visit for its redux at Northern Spark, and am excitedly running straight into new preparations. I thought 2,000 feet of cable was a lot, but I will need more…

Other stuff I managed to get to this week- last night I checked out the ArtCrank show. Minneapolis definitely loves its art, its bike culture, and beer, so putting all three together make quite a party.

Worthy of its own post later, I had the chance to catch Zoe Keating in concert on Thursday. It was one of the best shows I’ve seen. Both she and her music are nothing short of enchanting.

Samples

I’ve checked up on Status Update about once a week or so. I do this for a few reasons: to make sure things that can be buggy are still working, to restart it fresh so things are more likely to keep working, and other little maintenance tasks- and also to make copies of the collected recordings. One of my favorite things has been listening to recordings that have been left during the week. It’s kind of like opening presents on Christmas, only more unpredictable. What people have chosen to share can be introspective or sad or nonsensical, and at least one every time has made me laugh out loud.  It also turns into a kind of game to see if I can guess which question a recording is answering. Sometimes it’s pretty obvious, and for others I will never know for sure.

Here are a few samples:
Sample 1
Sample 2

And some good advice:
Sample 3
Sample 4
Sample 5

 

The next thing

It is bittersweet that the year in the AoV program is winding down. Tonight the Soap Factory hosts the remaining three artist talks, and while I’ve gotten to know these artists and their projects quite well, I’m looking forward to listening. I felt like there was a cohesion that came together in how I thought about my piece after “living with it” in the gallery. I found it interesting, during Aaron’s talk last week, to get a sense of the reactions and questions from people who experienced the piece in its current form without a front-row seat during several months of our conceptualization and process of revision. I imagine it will be the same tonight with Drew and Mike and Anthony’s pieces.

But, it is also exciting to move on to the next thing. The next thing for me is a site-specific reboot of my current project for the Northern Spark festival – so, the same base, but very different in terms of location and logistics. It should be a fun challenge. I have my first site visit this afternoon.

Northern Spark was one of my favorite nights of the year last year, playing the headphone concert at the Walker before heading out into the night to experience what other people had come together to create. I’m excited to be a part of it again in a new way.

Women in tech

Wow, this guy’s got a lot of gear!

She’s a girl, actually.

This was an observation of someone at the opening, peeking behind the curtain at Status Update’s tangled guts of wire and amplifiers and clicking relays- and the response of one of the other fellows, who told me about it later. When he told me about it, I laughed, pleased at the idea of altering someone’s perspective.

Being a woman working in media and using tools that tend to be something of a boys’ club is an interesting thing to me, though it’s a thing I’ve spent little time analyzing. Why did that exchange spark the reaction that it did? Would the assumption or reaction have been the same if I were a painter or a photographer or a choreographer or an actor? I’m not any of those things, so I really can’t say.

I do get a certain satisfaction from being something unexpected, but I’m also a bit disheartened that the assumption my piece was created by a guy may have been a common one.

The people – mostly guys – I’ve met in the electronic music/circuit bending/hardware hacking world are people with whom I clearly share common interests, and tend to get along well. I’ve found this niche of the music/art/tech world one that is incredibly welcoming and inclusive – but there is a lingering sense of female-ness as a novelty. It’s a feeling paralleled to a certain extent in the community of science fiction and fandom, with which I also self-define.

While I don’t really mind living with that self-consciousness (and appreciate it in some ways) I do wonder how it can or should or will effect my work or process, and if or how the knowledge that I’m a woman can unintentionally frame someone’s perception of what I’ve made.

 

AoV 3

The opening was fabulously attended and fantastic, if a bit overwhelming. Thanks to everyone who made it out! Everyone involved through the whole process- the artists, directors, mentors, critique panelists, all the staff and volunteers at the Soap Factory- have been great to work with. While the slow return of a more normalized, post-opening existence brings a certain relief, I will be genuinely sad to see such a focused-yet-experimental and motivating group environment come to a close. Thinking about projects I can delve into while I still feel some momentum.

A short photo summary – thanks to Dane McFarlane for the images.


My installation, Status Update


Drew Anderson’s Near the Ghosts of Sugarloaf


Mike Hoyt’s PoHo Posit


Anthony Tran’s Wire Less


Aaron Westre’s City Fight! 

(In this photo it’s my first game, against its creator. I did better than I expected!)

 

On Process and Deadlines

I remember hearing or reading something like art is never finished, it just stops in interesting places.

The hours are counting down before my first gallery opening, and perhaps even especially as someone who works a lot with improvisation and indeterminacy, I agree with this. Deadlines are a Thing. The grant proposals tend to be done when we need to submit them and rarely before. The play starts when the curtain goes up whether you feel ready or not. The Artists on the Verge fellows all received an emphatic email this week reminding us of the deadline we’ve all had in the back of our minds for the better part of a year. A deadline doesn’t take away the urge to poke or tweak or keep asking “what if I did this?”

Does this mean I’m a perfectionist, a procrastinator, or indecisive? Maybe. Creating something can have endless possibilities, and deciding means consciously closing paths available. That can be hard – there might be something really great  over there! A deadline makes decisions final, even if you might not want to be done exploring yet. And when something is declared finished, it also invites criticism and often an intimate look inside your mind – those parts can be debilitatingly frightening.

My deadline is very soon, but I think my piece has stopped in an interesting place. I’m excited for this weekend.

Breaking radio silence!

My goodness, the world keeps turning. I’m still alive and working on creative stuff. I have my first show in quite a while, and I’m extra super excited ’cause I’m making a rare appearance outside the Midwest: I’m going to be playing a set and talking about circuit bending as part of the one year anniversary party for Noisebridge, an awesome hacker/DIY space in San Francisco.
https://www.noisebridge.net/wiki/Year_1_Open_Hacker_House

Friday, October 2
9:15 pm
Noisebridge
2169 Mission Street
San Francisco, CA

february is going fast

It’s kind of hard to believe it’s going to be March next week already. February has been full of stuff!

The Spark festival was fantastic, as always. It simultaneously makes me happy to live in such a great creative community and like I’m really not doing enough to contribute to it. I spent a lot of my Spark at the Bedlam Theatre, where, embarrassingly, I hadn’t been since they changed venues. Their newer space is fantastic– bar, food, a main stage and a lounge, plus overflow space upstairs and a smoking deck! The sound system was great; it had been a while since I really pushed bass into the floor and it was really fun. (Getting a cheer for manipulating a cutoff filter sweep slowly from belly-rumble to audible range will always make me really happy.) I also had folks dancing. As I was the main room opener on a cold Wednesday night, that was likewise awfully satisfying. I’m having a lot of fun with newer, more beat-driven tracks.

Last night I played for What She Said to benefit the female slam poet champs’ trip to Detroit for the Women Of The World slam. It was a good time. Good poetry and good beer. I also won a few pounds of nice coffee at the silent auction, so I will be kept in caffeine for a while, hooray! Thanks so much to everyone who came out.

March looks more empty for the time being, which is good- I’ll be busy planning and scheming. Tour ideas are sprouting in my head, so please let me know if you think you’ve got a town I need to visit.

It is snowing like mad today. My evening commitments were canceled due to dangerous driving conditions, which instead makes tonight a night full of pizza and documentary-watching. I can’t wait. I leave you with a favorite from one of the late great Minneapolis band Trip Shakespeare:

It’s coming down…