For Immediate Release: Soundmarks June 8 – August 18, 2007 Curator: Liz Kelton Sheehan Featuring: Amy Stacey Curtis and Zach Poff + N.B. Aldrich
Press Preview: Thursday, June 7, 10am – 12pm
Opening reception: Friday, June 8, 6 – 9pm Contact: Natasha Khandekar Tel: 617.498.0100 Email: nkhandekar@artinteractive.org In the early 1970s, Canadian composer and theorist R. Murray Schafer founded the World Soundscape Project in order to study the relationship between people and their acoustic environments. Along with radical composer and “noisician” John Cage, Schafer argued that the sounds of our daily lives were an overlooked source of information and beauty, and were therefore potential artistic material. Schafer’s classification of the sounds in our environment helped codify a critical alternative to the musical and visual syntax that had previously limited the growth of Sound Art as a genre. “Soundmark,” derived from landmark, is his term for a sound unique to an area, place or community. In the spirit of Schafer’s inquiries, Soundmarks is comprised of site-specific sound and video installations by Amy Stacey Curtis and the team of Zach Poff + N.B. Aldrich. Employing both new media and traditional audio technologies, these artists experiment with ways in which Sound Art can serve as a catalyst for common experience and a site for community exchange. Exhibition Checklist Amy Stacey Curtis Exchange, 7.8.7 18 tape recorders, 18 cassette tapes, 18 pedestals, instructions, audience Amy Stacey Curtis Labyrinth, 7.8.7 9 cd players with headphones, 9 cds, instructions, audience Zach Poff + N.B. Aldrich The Sentiment Machine, 2007 Software-driven audio installation Zach Poff + N.B. Aldrich
The Aural Ecosystem, 2007 Multi-channel generative sound installation Zach Poff + N.B. Aldrich The Past is a Ghost, 2007 Software-driven video installation Selected Artist’s Bio Amy Stacey Curtis has scheduled ambitious exhibits of interactive installations through 2010. Each large-scale exhibit takes place in an abandoned space and requires audience participation. Amy has received various awards including the Maine Arts Commission’s 2005 Individual Artist Fellow for Visual Art. Curtis’s fourth solo-biennial SOUND, took place October 7-27, 2006 at the Lockwood Mill in Waterville, Maine. Her work has been featured at Grounds for Sculpture, New Jersey, the LAB, San Francisco, Woman Made Gallery, Chicago, the Bates College Museum of Art, Maine, and will be included in an upcoming solo exhibition at the Colby College Museum of Art, Maine. Zach Poff + N.B. Aldrich have been collaborating for the past five years creating audio, video, performance and installation work primarily in the areas of media and New Media. Their work has been featured at venues such as Artists Space, the Not Still Art Festival, the Optica Festival, Perform.Media, Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center, the Center for Maine Contemporary Art, the Bates College Museum of Art, the Polli Talu Arts Center, SoundLAB, and the Ayers Island Contemporary Arts Festival. Liz Kelton Sheehan is an independent curator living in Worcester, MA. She has worked at several museums in the New England area. Her most recent position was Assistant Curator for Academic and Exhibition Initiatives at the Bates College Museum of Art, Maine.