This summer, Chicago artists engage audiences in a dynamic five-week series of multidisciplinary performances that involve the rituals of animal husbandry; family squabbles broadcast via laser beams; and the Web 2.0 version of San Francisco’s 1967 “Summer of Love.” Here/Not There presents five weekly performances, beginning each Tuesday, from June 30 through August 2, 2009 at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA), Chicago. Artifacts and documentation from each performance are on exhibit in the gallery for the duration of the week to demonstrate how performance and visual art may coexist and compliment one another.
Week One (June 30 – July 5) – Katrina Chamberlin and James Kubie: The Body Parlor
Live performance: June 30 from 7-8 pm; July 4 from noon – 2 pm
Rituals of animal husbandry are re-enacted and their relationship to present society is examined. Ten actors disguised as laborers and sheep re-enact milking, skinning, and slaughtering to portray a sense of survival within a community. Milk is collected in pails; wool socks are removed from the actors’ (sheep) feet and their feet are washed with milk and lye soap made from sheep fat; and neck hair is shaved to symbolize shearing. After Tuesday night’s performance, the gallery presents collected materials from the performance (wool socks, hair, milk, and soap) along with a video of a performance.
Week 2 (July 7-12) – Patrick Lichty: Summer of Love 2.0
Live performance: July 7 at 7 pm
Patrick Lichty explores the online cultural convergence of Web 2.0 and compares this connectivity to the 1967 “Summer of Love” gathering of more than 100,000 young people in San Francisco. Two weeks prior to the installation, Lichty will send out a call to Web 2.0 websites such as Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube, and Second Life for discussion based on the question: “What is Love?” During the installation, texts (from sources such as Twitter) and images created in Second Life are projected live in the gallery. The installation begins with an interactive Second Life performance by Lichty’s group Second Front.
Week 3 (July 14-19) – Amber Ginsburg, Carla Duarte, and Lisa Rousset: re.pur.pose a work in material gestures
Live performance: July 14 at 7 pm
Using the gallery as a meeting room, Amber Ginsburg, Carla Duarte, and Lisa Rousset record and repurpose everyday materials through their durational performances. They place common objects, such as sweaters, bricks, and seeds, into yellow rickshaws and move throughout the museum and city streets. The artists ask people to help them repurpose the materials. The sweaters are transformed back into their previous state of wool strings; the bricks, originally pieces of architecture, become canvases for portraiture; and the seeds, which have been saved from foods the artists consumed, are distributed for future planting.
Week 4 (July 21-26) – Eric leonardson, Chad Clark, and Bret Ian Balogh: Chicago Phonography
Live performance: July 21 at 7 pm
Chicago Phonography is a local sound collective comprising sound artists and experimental musicians who perform live improvisations using audio recordings of Chicago’s urban soundscape. The collective performs using ambient recordings from the MCA, the surrounding neighborhood, and the world via internet streaming. In addition, the gallery becomes an interactive audio/visual digital mapping installation of the recorded sounds. A projected map with icons represents each established worldwide streamer that is playing in the space.
Week 5 (July 28- August 2)- Justin Cooper: Vay Kay
Live performances of Crater: July 28 at 7 pm, Sprinkle: July 30 from noon – 5 pm; Relax: July 31 all day; Crumple: August 1 from noon- 5 pm
Justin Cooper presents a four-part performance series themed around family vacations. Crater is an interactive sound installation that deconstructs an argument Cooper had with his family on a childhood vacation. A dialogue recorded by four actors representing Cooper, his parents, and sister, is broadcast in the gallery, controlled by four invisible laser beams. When a gallery visitor breaks a laser beam, that family member’s argument is triggered. With multiple viewers moving through the space, the vocal laser beams are activated at random intervals creating a fragmented cacophony that speaks to the way in which memory fragments past experiences. An overhead video camera captures visitor reactions and plays in the gallery each subsequent day. Sprinkle is an interactive performance that utilizes four lawn sprinklers on the MCA Plaza. Cooper re-creates a water-free sprinkler installation in the gallery the following day. Relax, a sound installation, plays ambient ocean sounds interspersed with the sounds of unknown creatures in the gallery and MCA Store. Copies of the CD are sold in the MCA Store. Crumple takes place in the MCA Sculpture Garden and presents a piece of Astroturf fitted with wire armatures that is “crumpled” like a piece of paper throughout the day.
The Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago
220 East Chicago Avenue, Chicago, IL 6061
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