Fred Moten – Chat
Fred Moten
In many ways, this Episode is our attempt to engage with Fred’s incredible writing: with his proposal that all black performance (culture, politics, sexuality, identity, and blackness itself) is improvisation.
Arika have been creating events since 2001. The Archive is space to share the documentation of our work, over 600 events from the past 20 years. Browse the archive by event, artists and collections, explore using theme pairs, or use the index for a comprehensive overview.
In many ways, this Episode is our attempt to engage with Fred’s incredible writing: with his proposal that all black performance (culture, politics, sexuality, identity, and blackness itself) is improvisation.
What does it mean to listen with the mind as well as the ears? A solo performance from the great avant-garde pianist.
A cast of pioneering spirits over an expanded three day festival including Jandek (one year on from his first ever show at INSTAL 04), JO-JO, Tetuzi Akiyama,Tom Bruno, Pauline Oliveros, a legendary Hijokaiden performance and Henri Chopin.
Perhaps the paradigm of America’s covert musical subculture, Sun City Girls operate just over the border of raucous delirium.
A performative survey of listening, as we managed to find it being used as a tool in different practices, disciplines and communities in North America (music, poetry, film, philosophy, activism…).
Long Stringed Instrument performance involving up to 100 wires strung in tension over a 40m arch.
Equal parts spectacle, installation and performance, his set for us is a specially developed work, ‘turning’, which features an orchestra of multiple turntables, 4 projections and a collection of old, and, quite probably, misfiring analogue kit.
These simple, one-take videos, relate personal experiences to the current conflicts in the Middle East via the most basic of means (a hotel room, a camcorder, John’s personal thoughts, concerns and convictions).
Usurper jamming live in a skip at the site of Bud’s Neill’s Lobey Dosser statue on Woodlands Road.
A sort of prayer and conference, a sort of scream and dialogue – a monologue and declaration at the time, addressing how we can build complicity with one another.
A guitar solo of frugal wringing, of notes in the dark, an attitude of making everything count.
The mutability of the body and the mobility of identity: queered pop culture, drag, lip-sync and performance.