May 13, 2019
Doors At 7. Music At 7:30pm
Kim Alpert is one of the most exciting artists to be working with multimedia materials on the international scene. For OPTION, Kim mixes real-time video synthesis and feedback, with movement and sonic artist components. Kim will discuss her creative history and ideas with Ken Vandermark following the performance.
Within
Kim Alpert focuses her personal practice on creating interdisciplinary ritual like performances where she connects her experiences and observations into improvised moments with other artists. Within connects body movement with analog light processing though video synthesis and feedback with a score composed of collected and recorded material. This work is designed to explore Kim Alpert’s experience living with dysmorphia and her journey from living with her body to living in her body.
The performance includes movement artist, Jasmine Mendoza and musician Ben LaMar Gay triangulating their discipline into the system Kim has designed for this piece along with material from other regular collaborators and friends.
Kim Alpert believes, first and foremost, in human-centric design and integrating technology with strategy in her time-based work. With a background in fine art, music, and carpentry Kim brings an attention to detail and diverse styles to her video installation, live performance and advertising work. Kim’s art primarily focuses on humanism, media and change incorporating historical and found material. Kim holds a degree in Digital Art & Design from Full Sail University and was inducted into their Hall of Fame in 2013. Kim's work has displayed at places like the Stony Island Arts Bank, SOFA Expo, The Modern Wing at the Art Institute of Chicago, Facets Cinematheque and is on permanent display in The National Music Centre of Canada. Kim has toured internationally creating video systems and performances for Mike Reed’s Flesh & Bone, Rob Mazurek’s Alien Flower Sutra, Haley Fohr, The Instigation Festival, and her own improvisation group, Scan Lines.
Jasmine Mendoza is a Mexicana movement artist interested in exploring the roots and origin of her ancestors through time, environment, spiritual and ritualistic practices. Her work is heavily image based in connection and conversation with nature’s elements - water, earth, fire, wind, light, darkness and space. Jasmine is deeply fascinated by the practices and ideas surrounding Butoh and BodyWeather which drive and inspire her work immensely.
Ben LaMar Gay is a composer/cornetist who moves components of sound, color, and space through folkloric filters to produce brilliant electro-acoustic collages. The unification of various styles is always in service of the narrative and never solely a display of technique. The Chicago native’s true technique is giving life to an idea while exploring and expanding on the term “Americana”. His musical influences derive from his collection of experiences in all of the Americas and the gathered data channeled by technology and its amplifying accessibility. The fact that the world is closer via technology and that everyone has access to the possibility of exploring different ideas, makes his avant-garde version of “Americana” very global. Embracing international vision while remaining true to his roots, Gay’s creative output aligns with the honest notion that he only knows how to be a man from the South side of Chicago. Active in the vibrant experimental music scene of Chicago, including a three-year residency in Brazil, allows him to collaborate with some influential figures in the world of music. The list includes George Lewis, Itibere Zwarg, Black Monks of Mississippi, Nicole Mitchell, Jeff Parker, Mike Reed, Joshua Abrams, Celso Fonseca, Tomeka Reid, Bixiga 70 and the Association of the Advancement of Creative Musicians, to name a few.