29 May 1:00 PM New York | 20:00 St. Petersburg
Panelists: Phill Niblock, Katherine Liberovskaya, Jonathan Hiam, Carol Parkinson, Sergey Komarov
Moderator: Natalia Kolodzei
This talk focused on issues of the collection and preservation of hybrid digital media. What changes have taken place in techniques for archiving and restoring sound art, experimental media and intermedia works? What difficulties arise in the process of creating modern sound archives? What approaches and methods are used to reproduce and restore archived works? What are the capabilities of modern technologies and what problems do they present?
Phill Niblock is an intermedia artist using music, film, photography, video and computers. He was born in Indiana in 1933. Since the mid-60’s he has been making music and intermedia performances which have been shown at numerous venues around the world. Since 1985, he has been the director of the Experimental Intermedia Foundation in New York where he has been an artist/member since 1968. He is the producer of Music and Intermedia presentations at EI since 1973 and the curator of EI’s XI Records label. Phill Niblock’s music is available on the XI, Moikai, Mode, Matiere Memoire, Room 40, and Touch labels. DVDs of films and music are available on the Extreme label and Von Archive. He is a retired professor of film, video and photography at The College of Staten Island, the City University of New York. In 2014, he was the recipient of the prestigious John Cage Award from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts.
Katherine Liberovskaya is a Canadian intermedia artist based in New York City. Involved in experimental video since the 80s, she has produced numerous single-channel video art pieces, video installations and video performances, as well as works in other media, that have been shown around the world. Since 2001 her work predominantly focuses on the intersection of moving image with sound/music in various both ephemeral and fixed forms (projections, installations, performances), notably through collaborations with composers and sound artists in improvised live video+sound concert situations where her live visuals seek to create improvisatory “music” for the eyes. In addition to her artwork, she curates events in experimental video/film, sound/music and A/V performance (primarily Screen Compositions since 2005 and OptoSonic Tea since 2006). In 2014 she completed a Ph.D. in art practice entitled “Improvisatory Live Visuals: Playing Images Like a Musical Instrument” at the Universite du Quebec in Montreal (UQAM).
Carol Parkinson is the Executive Director of Harvestworks, a digital media arts center located in New York City. Since 1987, her focus has been on the development of experimental artworks that explore sound, data and other emerging technologies. Parkinson’s professional services include panel participation at the New York Foundation for the Arts, the New York State Council on the Arts, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Parkinson is the Executive Producer of the New York Electronic Art Festival, a series of workshops, concert performances and exhibitions centered on art and technology. Parkinson is a founding member of TELLUS, the Audio Cassette Magazine, a cassette-based magazine of experimental music and sound art published between 1982–1996. Parkinson’s educational background includes the University of Wisconsin at Madison, Skidmore College and the Whitney Museum’s Independent Study Program in New York City.
Jonathan Hiam is the Curator of the Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound and the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center. He specializes in American music and recorded sound, with a particular emphasis on 20th-century music. He oversees one of the world’s largest sound archives, which contains audio recordings and other materials that document the earliest days of recording through to today’s digital media. He also curates and assists researchers with the extensive American Music Collection, which covers the full range of American music, from early manuscripts, scores, and sheet music to the papers of major contemporary American composers. He holds an MA in Music History and Literature from Boston University and a PhD in Musicology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Sergey Komarov is a sound artist and curator. In 2003-2005, he curated the Oscillation Works label that published works by Russian experimental musicians. Since 2008, he has worked as a computer programmer and an engineer at CYLAND Media Art Lab; since 2010, he has initiated the Kurvenschreiber Collective. Since 2013, has curated CYFEST International Media Art Festival audio projects and CYLAND Audio Archive (cyland.bandcamp.com). Sergey Komarov is a participant of CYFESTs of various years, ArchStoyanie Festival (2014, Kaluga Region, Russia), “The Creative Machine 2” exhibition at Goldsmiths, University of London (2018, UK), exhibitions at Pratt Institute, The National Arts Club, Ca’Foscari University and Experimental Intermedia. Lives and works in Kaluga and St. Petersburg, Russia.
LASER TALKS
The Leonardo/ISAST LASERs are a program of international gatherings that bring artists, scientists, humanists and technologists together for informal presentations, performances and conversations with the wider public to over 52 cities around the world. The mission of LASER is to encourage contribution to the cultural environment of a region by fostering interdisciplinary dialogue and opportunities for community building.
In September 2020, CYLAND Media Art Lab has become the official representative of The Leonardo / Laser Talks Cyland