The 2005 ISCM World Music Days, held this year in Zagreb, in conjunction with the Music Biennale Zagreb, played host to an audio installation by Canadian-American composer and sound artist Eric Marty. Marty’s Ochre With represented the US in this year’s festival, which took place from April 15 – April 24 in the Croatian City.
Eric Marty is an Athens based composer and sound artist, and winner of several international awards, including the 1998 Stauffer prize from the Canada Council for the Arts, the 2004 ALEA III International Composition Prize, and a fellowship from the Akademie Schloss Solitude in Germany for the year 2006.
The first World Music Days were held in 1923 in Salzburg, and have been held every year since (except during World War II). Organized by the ISCM (the International Society for Contemporary Music), the World Music Days Festival is one of the world’s most important venues for contemporary music. This year’s World Music Days featured the music of 79 composers from 37 countries.
The Music Biennale Zagreb (held every two years since 1961 in the former Yugoslavian city of Zagreb) played an important role during the Cold War in bringing together music of the East and West. In its first years, the Kremlin and the State Department both financed delegations to the Yugoslavian festival, which welcomed the Bolshoi Ballet and Moscow Philharmonic, the Berlin and Hamburg Operas, and composers Igor Stravinsky and John Cage. Today, the Biennale continues to be an important component of the European festival circuit.
Marty’s installation, Ochre With, was supported by the Canada Council for the Arts and by ICE. The interactive work is a sound environment featuring flocks of ethereal, bird-like sounds flying about the audience in three dimensions. A computer hears the audience walking through the exhibition space and alters the behavior of the sound environment in response to what it hears. Ochre With was also exhibited in 2003 at the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center.
Ochre With belongs to a series of works called the With Triptychs, a series which includes three works for orchestra, three works for piano and three sound installations. Liquid With, an orchestral work from the series, won a Morton Gould award from ASCAP. That work and three others from the series were funded by the Canada Council for the Arts.
Eric Marty was born in 1969 in San Francisco, and studied composition in Montreal, Canada and Berkeley, California. He has taught at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, The University of California at Berkeley, and now teaches sound art, music theory, and interactive performance at the University of Georgia.
Thursday, April 7 at 6:30 PM
ICE Studio, Tanner Building Room 101
An evening of informal presentations featuring Dr. Richard Neupert, John Foreman and Lydia Greer, and Martijn van Wagtendonk. Dr. Richard Neupert, Head of UGA Film Studies, will select and screen historical examples of experimental animation. John Foreman and Lydia Greer will demonstrate their Robotic Pinscreen Animation prototype – in development since the fall and supported in part by ICE. Lamar Dodd School of Art Professor Martijn van Wagtendonk will present his work and discuss his upcoming stop-motion Maymester course.
Graduate student Ben Coolik is no stranger to success. He is a collaborative artist in the field of performance who has worked in some of the country’s leading venues and conferences. His work crosses and often combines multiple disciplines including lighting design, music composition, interactive multi-media design and programming as well as performance. Ben is also an avid researcher and has recently been published at the R.E.M. Web site and in Lighting and Sound America magazine. His most recent collaborative efforts, Paradise Hotel and E.L.I., were supported by grants from ICE (Ideas for Creative Exploration) where Ben is currently serving on the Interactive Performance Research Task Force.
Expected graduation: May 2005
Degree Objective: Master of Fine Arts in Theatrical Design
Other degrees: B.S. in Finance; University of Georgia, 1997
University highlights, achievements and awards: During the past two years as a graduate student, my achievements have been more artistic and less academic in nature. I was invited to participate in the Sydney Kahn
Summer Institute at The Kitchen in New York City (Summer 2003) with 17 other artists from around the country. I was nominated as the sole Graduate Student representative on the ICE (Ideas for Creative Exploration) Grant Selection Committee. While in New York, I helped create E.L.I.: an interactive performance project. E.L.I. received a grant from ICE and we were invited to present E.L.I. at The Kitchen’s 5th Annual Street Festival in NYC (2003) as well as the first annual IDMAA Conference in Orlando (2004). I was also involved with another ICE funded project: Paradise Hotel –a Richard Foreman play adapted by Cal Clements. I am currently a member of ICE’s Interactive Performance Research Task Force. My research on lighting designer, Willie Williams, was published on the R.E.M. Web site in November, 2004, and my article on The Alliance Theatre’s world premier production of The Color Purple: the musical was published in Light and Sound America magazine in March 2005. This past semester (Fall 2004) I was chosen for an internship at The Alliance Theatre in Atlanta working in both the lighting and sound departments.
Current employment: As a graduate student on assistantship, I work in the Theatre Department’s “Scene Shop” dealing with all technical aspects of mounting departmental productions including building, painting, lighting and sound work.
High School: Brookstone School
Hometown: Columbus, Georgia
I chose to attend UGA because… I come from a history of UGA graduates so I have always considered it as an option. My decision to come back here for graduate school was mostly motivated by my infatuation with Athens. This city has a close, hard-working, and diverse artistic community. Because of Athens’ size, it is easy to network and find other people interested in collaborative work. As a musician, I also love the vibrant music scene.
My favorite things to do on campus are… I enjoy taking walks around campus and appreciating the contrast between the magnificent architecture and the beauty of the nature-scapes. I also really enjoy the UGA library. Because of my work-load, however, I mostly find myself in the computer lab at the department.
When I have free time, I like… …going for long walks, playing my guitar and keyboard, listening to music, shopping for food and cooking delicious vegan meals, and visiting with my friends.
The craziest thing I’ve done is… In the summer of 1995, I went to Manchester, England, and I got a job reading tarot cards for a psychic hotline. That was pretty crazy.
My favorite place to study is… …in the comfort of my own home. This works for me because I have control over my environment there. I can put on music (or not), have some hot tea, and enjoy some sweet treats while I work.
My favorite professor is… David Saltz. He is extremely knowledgeable about the subjects he teaches, and he is also very enthusiastic. He has helped to shape my artistic direction through encouragement and advice, and he has led me to discover a rich history of interactive interdisciplinary performative work that has influenced my own graduate/artistic work.
If I could share an afternoon with anyone, I would love to share it with… …my mother. Her life has had such a tremendous impact on me. My creative nature, the values that I try to uphold, and my personal philosophy about life and the interconnectedness of all things can all be traced back to her own good and generous nature.
If money was not a consideration, I would love to… …spend my time helping bring the creative force of the arts to the forefront of our culture and daily lives. By helping to shed light on the many independent and important artistic endeavors happening all over the world, I could hopefully foster a greater appreciation for the role art plays in our lives. Through this appreciation of art, I would hope that people could fine their own creative nature and nurture it. I believe this is one of the best ways to celebrate the gift of life.
After graduation, I plan to… …stay in Athens and be a part of the growing energy of our artistic community. I hope to work on various artistic endeavors including lighting design (especially for dance), music, artistic management and promotion, and collaborative performance art projects. I hope to launch a new company that will focus on helping promote and manage independent musicians and artists to whose work I am drawn.
The one UGA experience I will always remember will be… …the Saturday when Christian Croft and I took E.L.I. around to all of the pre-game tailgate parties at the Auburn-Georgia football game in the Fall of 2003. The reactions we got were unforgettable.
John Foreman and Lydia Greer are both 3rd year undergraduates at UGA, where they are Mathematics and Film Studies majors, respectively. They’ve been friends since highschool and are now married. Last year Lydia took a film studies course which dealt with the history of experimental animation, such as the work of Len Lye and Norman McLaren with their direct manipulation of film stock to create animations. Especially fascinating to Lydia, was the work of Alexander Alexeieff, an engraver turned animator who sought to develop a technique which essentially animated engravings.
The technique Alexeieff developed was called pinscreen animation. A pinscreen frame is created by shining a light across hundreds of pins pushed through a white board to create a black and white, completely chiaroscuro image out of the pin shadows. An animation is developed simply by filming frame after frame on the pinscreen, shifting the pins as necessary to create motion between frames.
John and Lydia both became very interested in this animation technique, however moving the pins by hand on a pinscreen is extremely labor intensive (it can take years to make one short film), and neither of the two students had the time to devote to such a project. Pinscreen modeling software had already been written, however computer animations often look too crisp, the nails look nothing like nails, and the shadows are too perfect.
Thus, the students decided on a computer-aided compromise. Beginning this past fall with the aid of CURO, ICE, and the National Science Foundation, Lydia and John built a physical pinscreen whose pins can be pushed via a robotic printer which communicates via infrared with a computer. The computer tells the robot where to push the pins by taking in live action digital photography and converting the digital frames into pinlengths to be transfered to the board.
September 9, 2004
Red & Black UGA Student Newspaper
‘Paradise’ gets some play downtown
By: Sonya Elkins
It’s not all about sex — but almost.
Sexuality, libido, spirituality and love are the themes that drive the avant garde play “Paradise Hotel,” opening downtown on Thursday, said director Joshua Waterstone.
“Sexuality is such a big thing. It’s a part of our daily life,” said Waterstone, a senior from Kennesaw. “I think the play isn’t tame in its presentation, but it’s not that far off from a conversation that girls or guys could have in a bar.”
“Paradise Hotel” mixes stylized, overtly sexual poses and speech, written and pre-recorded dialog, a rotating set and an interactive target to create a unique world.
The play is a work of Richard Foreman, founder of the Ontological-Hysterical Theater in New York City, whose absurdist works reject traditional theatrical “realism.”
Foreman’s play departs from more traditional tactics of creating an emotional connection between the characters and audience and maintaining a suspension of disbelief, said Jennifer Morris, a senior from Savannah acting in the play.
Characters and events are enacted to be judged as a play rather than as a possible “real life” situation. The unique characteristics, its non-linear plot line and its sexual content lend to the controversial nature of the show, Morris said. However, she said she hoped a variety of people would come out to experience the play.
“Athens hasn’t really seen a play like this before,” she said. “It’s controversial, but it’s all in fun. I hope people can take it that way.”
And any type of personal reaction to a performance can teach something valuable to audience members about themselves and “where they stand in human life,” Waterstone said. “Even the action of being appalled is a worthwhile reaction.”
The production received part of its funding through a grant of about $3,000 from Ideas for Creative Exploration, a University multi-disciplinary initiative for research in the arts, Waterstone said.
Local artists and drama students have been collaborating for almost a year on the Athens production of the play, which was originated by former University comparative literature instructor Cal Clements.
James Simmons, a senior from Stone Mountain acting in the play, said that several separate aspects of the play attracted him to it.
“Aside from being very different, it’s very funny,” he said. “There’s a lot of humor and it’s sincere at the same time.”
In addition to having entertainment value, the show is very chaotic and intended to be thought-provoking, Morris said. It goes beyond being just a play to sit and enjoy, attempting to offer audience members something to think about afterwards, she added.
That lasting impression is what Daniel Lebow, a University alumnus acting in the play, said he hoped audience members would take from the production.
“I hope it expands their minds,” he said. “Not that they’ll just think about life in a different way, but that they’ll be different.”
