- For Immediate Release –

Date: August 1, 2001

Contact: David Means, Associate Professor, First College (651) 793-3967

Seventh International Festival of Experimental Intermedia Art Coming to Nobles Studio

Friday events begin October 12th through November 16th and December 7th at 8pm at the Nobles eXperimental interMedia Studio, Metropolitan State University

645 E. Seventh St., St. Paul. (651) 793-3967

http://www.geocities.com/davismenas/

Metropolitan State University

Program in Experimental Intermedia Art presents:

Strange Attractors VII

7th International Festival of Experimental Intermedia Art

October 12th – November 16th and December 7th, 2001

Nobles eXperimental interMedia Studio

Metropolitan State University

A new generation of artists, some from the visual arts and others from theater, music, performance and the media arts, are creating new materials, performance practices and methods of artistic expression, which combine and redefine traditional art forms. Strange Attractors VII, the seventh international festival of experimental intermedia art, will bring to Metropolitan State University a collection of renowned artists in a celebration of new work and creativity. The festival will offer a flexible and interactive environment for artists to present and discuss their work to audiences who will have a unique opportunity to experience these works in diverse and creative ways. All events are at Metro State’s Nobles experimental interMedia Studio beginning at 8:00 p.m. Admission per event is $6 general public/$4 students/seniors. The featured artists and groups are:

 

Frank Theater (MN) Director Wendy Knox presents a compelling production of Bertolt Brecht’s The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui, as part of Frank Theater’s 2001 season.

Friday, October 12th

 

George Cartwright with the Deep Narrative Band (MN) – The legendary saxophonist and founder of Curlew joins guitarist Davis Menas, sampling laptop wiz Steve Goldstein and guest visual artists in a multimedia event.

Friday, October 19th

 

Turkish Delights(Turkey) – Mehmet Serdar Guvenc assembles an ensemble of Turkish musicians studying in the Twin Cities for an evening of new instrumental and vocal music based on Turkish cultural themes.

Friday, October 26th

 

Johnny Rodriguez (San Antonio)– The San Antonio composer-performer returns to Nobles just in time for El Dia de los Muertos, a ritual performance for voices, objects and instruments.

Friday, November 2nd

 

Psycick Slutz (MN) – The local performance collective will shake things up at Nobles with an evening of intermedia music and theatrical madness.

Friday, November 9th

 

Heidi Arneson (MN) – The local performer curates and performs a special evening for the Nobles festival.

Friday, November 16th 

                                                               

David Revill (GB) and The Nobles experimental interMedia GroupThe British-born composer-performer joins the Nobles Group in presenting projects from the fall semester classes in Creativity and Experimental Music.       

Friday, December 7th

 

Strange Attractors are those mysterious fields that produce wobbly figure-eight patterns depicted in recent studies of chaos theory. They border on the fringe of order and randomness, yet seem to have an underlying structure of interest to artists and scientists alike. The festival celebrates aspects of chaos and attraction in the collaborative, compositional process, the interaction between performers and audience, and the spontaneous transformation of materials into forms of intermedia expression. 

 

Strange Attractors Festivals are presented at the Nobles eXperimental interMedia Studio. Originally built as light manufacturing space for a World War II defense contractor, the Nobles facility provides a flexible, urban arts environment suitable for a wide range of experimental intermedia activities. The festival is produced by Metro State's Program in Experimental Intermedia Art, which includes classes in intermedia arts, creativity, collaboration and experimental music, and a creative capstone in intermedia performance.

 

The Nobles eXperimental interMedia Group consists of Metro State students and guest artists who develop original intermedia performances and installations in conjunction with classes in Metro State's Program of Experimental Intermedia Art. Guest artists and graduates of the group include Anthony Cox, Marlene Tupy-Gaboury, Steve Goldstein, Georgia Stephens, Jacqueline Ultan, and Johnny Rodriguez. In 1999 the group joined California Composer Ron George at the Walker Art Center as part of its "Gallery 8" series, and Georgia Stephens, performing her festival work "I Have Wished to be Queen" at the Walker / Minnesota Dance Alliance "Choreographers' Evening" and at Washington University, St. Louis in September, 2000.

 

Strange Attractors I (Spring, 1998) featured David Revill (England), Cinnamon Sphere (Toronto), Mario Van Horrik and Petra Dubach (Holland), Johnny Rodriguez (San Antonio), and the Electric Arts Duo (Ohio), with new works by the Nobles experimental interMedia Group.

 

Strange Attractors Il (Spring, 1999) featured Paul Higham (England), Ursula Scherer (Switzerland), Michael Schumacher (New York City), Ron George (Los Angeles), Blood Magnet (Minnesota), and

T.E.O.T.W.A.W.K.l. Consort (Minnesota) with new works by the Nobles experimental interMedia Group, including new operas by Anthony Cox and David Means.

 

Strange Attractors III (Fall, 1999) featured Dan Senn (Tacoma), Linda Dusman (Boston). Johnny Rodriguez (San Antonio), Georgia Stephens (Minnesota), Harold Fortuin (Minnesota) and Benderflaus (Minnesota), with new works by the Nobles experimental interMedia Group.

 

Strange Attractors IV (Spring, 2000) featured local artists and groups Burnt House, Spud Wells and his New Rhythm Ranch Hands, Steve Carlino and "Cafe Hemingway" by the Nobles experimental interMedia Group.

 

Strange Attractors V (Fall, 2000) featured David Revill (England), AudioFiction I, Susan Rawcliffe (Los Angeles), Warren Burt (Australia), Dixie Treichel and the Unique Sounds Ensemble, and the Nobles experimental interMedia Group’s “Art Car”.

 

Strange Attractors VI (Spring, 2001) featured Fred Ho (Brooklyn); WingDingWamJammyII; Jon Spayde, Heidi Arneson and Tertulia’s Exquisite Corpse Ensmble (MN); the Deep Narrative Band (MN); Toylander Arsonists International (NYC); Georgia Stephens (MN) and the Nobles eXperimental interMedia Group.

 

Strange Attractors VIII (Spring, 2002) will feature the Composers Commissioning Program premier of Los Angeles composer Ron George’s new work for mixed ensemble of voices, instruments and American Gamelon based on Icelandic microtonal vocal music.

 

Strange Attractors VII – Festival Artists’ Bios and Materials

 

Ekkehard Shall as Arturo Ui in the 1959

Berliner Ensemble production of “The Resistible

Rise of Arturo Ui”

 

Frank Theater – The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui – Friday, October 12th at 8:00

 

Frank Theatre invades St. Paul for the first time in ten years with its latest production. Bertolt Brecht’s

THE RESISTIBLE RISE OF ARTURO UI, will be presented at the former Nobles munitions plant located at 645 E. 7th Street (Mounds Blvd. and 7th St. E., now called the Nobles eXperimental interMedia studio), Sept.

20-Oct.14. Performances are Thursday-Saturday at 8:00, and Sunday at 2:00. Tickets are $14 - $18, with a $2 discount for students, seniors, low income and artists; for information and reservations, call (612)

724-3760.

 

When an economic slump provides prime conditions for the rise of a small-time thug (strikingly similar to Al Capone) to take over the vegetable trade in 1930’s Chicago, a parallel is set up for the story of another thug who is rising to power on the world stage in 1941, Adolf Hitler. A viciously funny “parable play,” written in but rarely performed in the United States, THE RESISTIBLE RISE OF ARTURO UI is brilliantly marked by Brecht’s mixing of history and fiction in a wide ranging style of parody and pastiche. From Shakespeare’s Richard III,

Lady Anne, and Mark Antony to Al Capone, Faust and the 1930’s gangster film “Scarface”, Brecht uses the juxtaposition of historical figures and Chaplinesque comedy to raise pointed questions as to how those who

ascend  to power are assisted  in their rise.

 

Bertolt Brecht, who wrote THE THREEPENNY OPERA  (which Frank Theatre staged to critical and popular acclaim in 1999, listed on all major “Best Of” lists), is one of the most important and influential dramatists of the 20th century. The innovations of his "epic theater," as well as the revolutionary message of his plays and actions, have had a profound effect on the contemporary theatre. In 1933, he fled Germany, living as a refugee in Denmark, Finland and the United States (1941-47) where he wrote ARTURO UI. He was fascinated with American gangsters and Charlie Chaplin, and gravely concerned about events in world politics

Of the time.

 

The Frank Theatre production of THE RESISTIBLE RISE OF ARTURO UI will be performed in a non-traditional venue, a former ammunition factory in St. Paul located at 645 E. Mounds Blvd. (7th Street and Mounds Blvd.). A

facility of Metro State University, the Nobles Factory was originally built as manufacturing space for a defense contractor. The 12,000 square foot building, currently housing an intermedia arts studio, is slated for demolition as it occupies the site for Metro State’s future library. The October 12 performance is presented as part of  “Strange Attractors VII” International Festival of Experimental Intermedia Arts.

 

The cast of twenty who will perform ARTURO UI (which has not been produced locally since the Guthrie production in the late 60s) will be led by Frank co-founder Bernadette Sullivan in the title role, with Frank veterans Tom Sherohman, Maria Asp, Mark Rhein, John Riedlinger, Grant Richey (of “Martini & Olive).

 

Frank Theatre is a professional theatre company which is committed to producing unique work which stretches the skills of the artists who create the work while simultaneously challenging the everyday perceptions of the audience through the exploration of ideas and issues of social, political and/or cultural concern. Previous productions include PERFECT PIE, THE ADVENTURES OF HERCULINA, THE THREEPENNY OPERA,

KALEVALA: dream of the salmon maiden, THE CHEKHOV PROJECT, and others.

 

For further information, contact Frank Theatre, (612) 724 3760.

 

 

Composer-Saxophonist George Cartwright

Born and raised in Mississippi and residing in NYC from the early ‘80’s to the mid ‘90’s (and collaborating with some of the finest musicians of the so-called “downtown” scene), George Cartwright has repeatedly and deftly mingled rural and urban elements into a distinctive aural blend over his 20 year career. His music is as steeped in the “blues” and “soul” as it is hard edged avant garde “jazz”. Drawing from such diverse material and inspiration, the music is often as much at odds with it’s environments as it is at one with them, to the extent that Option magazine once described Curlew (Mr. Cartwright’s best known band) as “the best and most obstinately committed band to emerge from New York’s Knitting Factory-based alternative music scene.”

But this is not to suggest that George Cartwright’s music is an eccentric incongruity, mixing antithetical constituents for the sake of novelty. On the contrary and above all, his music is thick, dark, and earthy (without being dense), sprightly, nimble, and fleet (without being manic), honest, heartfelt, and fervent (without being gushy). His recordings are a variety of smoky, steamy, swampy sonic stews, swirling and swimming around the senses, and ultimately possessing palpable fragrance, flavor, and feeling.

George Cartwright recently released his second solo cd, THE MEMPHIS YEARS (Cuneiform), a long anticipated follow up to his 1994 release, DOT (Cuneiform), and the result of his five year involvement in the Memphis music scene. Happily, THE MEMPHIS YEARS also finds Mr. Cartwright reunited with “poem writer” Paul Haines and the remarkable singer Amy Denio (rhymes with Ohio). Mr. Haines’ words and Ms. Denio’s voice respectively and respectfully enhanced the 1992 Curlew release A BEAUTIFUL WESTERN SADDLE (Cuneiform). It is also essential to be reminded that the work of Mr. Haines graced the classic Carla Bley albums ESCALATOR OVER THE HILL and TROPIC APPETITES.

Of THE MEMPHIS YEARS, All About Jazz modern jazz editor Glenn Astarita writes:

“Cartwright draws upon his Southern roots to compile a special blend of ‘Memphis-Horns’ style R&B along with forward thinking rock, funk and jazz improvisation…the overall results prove to be curiously stimulating and a bit abstract yet altogether foot-stomping and gregariously festive!…The hodgepodge of serpentine arrangements, bold tenacity and decisive soloing impart a distinctive edge or more importantly a refreshingly entertaining view of traditional grooves intermingled with newfangled propositions…With the The Memphis Years Cartwright cross-pollinates the old with the new in artful fashion, yet it all sounds so genuine and uninhibited but then again, we wouldn’t expect anything less...* * * * ½”

 

Mehmet Serdar Guvenc

Mehmet Serdar Guvenc has been creating exciting electric guitar solos and forming new music ensembles in his native country of Turkey, and since coming to the United States in 1998.  A current graduate student at Metro State University, Serdar has performed with Mary Garvie and David Means in several musical events at Metro State and at Mounds Theater, St. Paul. He will present an evening of Turkish music with fellow Turkish musicians from the University of Minnesota for Strange Attractors VII festival.

Composer-musician Johnny Rodriguez

Johnny Rodriguez is renowned for his ritualistic solo performance pieces which draw heavily on his cultural identity with the Texas borderlands.  He has performed collaboratively with Texas musicians, ensembles and with David Means in his environmental performance installations “Cannon River Wave/Forms” (1992) and “Stanton Airfield Land/Forms” (1994). For the Strange Attractors VII Festival, he will present a ritual performance based on  “El Dia de los Muertos”, or Day of the Dead.

 

 

Heidi Arneson is renowned for her one person shows and for her ability to nurture creativity in others. She has performed all over the country and at nearly every venue in the Twin Cities including the Walker Art Center, the Southern Theater, The Playwrights Center’s "Hot House" series, and Red Eye Collaboration Theater. For the Strange Attractors VII Festival, she will preview "The Snake Lady Sheds Her Skin", to be premiered later at Red Eye Collaboration Theater.

 

Psycick Slutz

Psycick Slutz challenge audiences everywhere with their slogan “Building Community through Promiscuity”.  Their approach to intermedia theater and performance art often examines the roots of cultural privilege and power structuring in a postmodern political stew.  Rich with references to contemporary thought and pop culture, the Slutz take no prisoners in their fast-paced performance events.

composer-performer David Revill

 

David Means, Strange Attractors Festival Producer

David Means was born on the same day the sound barrier was broken.He studied architecture at the University of Illinois at Urbana where he participated in the original (1967) "Music Circus" event staged by John Cage.After compulsory military service in Vietnam, he returned to Illinois and the formal study of music, integrating aspects of invented notation into sculptural scores and performance installations for a variety of architectural and environmental settings.His music has been presented at such places as the New Music America Festivals, (Minneapolis, Hartford, Houston), Dance Theater Workshop, Experimental Intermedia and the Roulette Performance Series, (New York City), and the Stuttgart Graphic Music Festival.His graphic scores, installations and performance systems have been exhibited and presented by the Walker Art Center, IRCAM (Paris), Documenta IX (Kassel), the Xi An Conservatory of Music (China), Het Stroomhuis (Holland), Logos Foundation (Belgium) and the Arts Council of Great Britain.He is a four-time recipient of the McKnight Composer Fellowship and has received fellowships and grants from the Bush Foundation, the Minnesota Arts Board, the Jerome Foundation's Composer Commissioning Program, and Meet the Composer, Inc.He has taught music and performance art at the University of Illinois, the Minneapolis College of Art and Design and the MacPhail Center for the Arts.He is currently an Associate Professor in The First College, and Coordinator of the Program in Experimental Intermedia Art in the Media and Fine Arts Department at Metropolitan State University, where he produces the Strange Attractors International Festival of Experimental Intermedia Art each semester at the Nobles experimental interMedia Studio, which he directs for Metro State in St. Paul.

Among his major works are CANNON RIVER WAVE/FORMS, a computer sound and performance installation along the historic Riverfront Commons in Northfield, Minnesota; STANTON AIRFIELD LAND/FORMS, a Mayan creation myth played out on intersecting grass runways in rural Minnesota; THE VILLAGERS PROJECT, a series of operas based on a Haida Indian myth; and SUPPORT SYSTEMS, a series of site-specific performance installations for various architectural spaces. His recorded music is available on Innova Recordings and from Dymaxion Music, and his 1992 performance installation, BERLINER ANDENKEN, is distributed on videotape by Intermedia Arts Minnesota.

In addition to his own projects he has collaborated extensively with other creative artists, forming organizations such as Roulette Intermedium (NYC) or the Nobles experimental interMedia Group (St. Paul), and creating new intermedia works with choreographers Georgia Stephens, Laurie Van Wieren and Chris Aiken; sound artists Mario Van Horrik and Petra Dubach and Sonic Architecture (Bill and Mary Buchen); writers JoAnne Makela and Nicole Neimi; visual artists David Cole, Dean Lettenstrom and Galen Brown; videographer Jim Malec, and composers Warren Burt, Susan Rawcliffe, Dan Senn, Johnny Rodriguez, Ron George, Fred Ho, Carei Thomas, Gary Schulte, Wendy Ultan, Steve Goldstein, among others.

In recent years he has developed a personal pitch-to-MIDI performance system for his 1959 Gretsch “Firebird” electric guitar and a mid-Eighties vintage Yamaha digital wind controller.In his current “Deep Narratives Project” Means uses this performance system as a “home sound base” for a series of sound and performance installations in which he interacts with fellow artists and ambient surroundings to invigorate and engage texts, images, scores, videos and spoken performance. 

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