OptoSonic Tea @ Diapason with Dan Conrad (chromaccord), Jorge Martins (live sound); and George O. Stadnik (photon guitar) with James Ross (live sound); Invited respondent/moderator: Eric Rosenzveig :: March 7, 2010; 5:00 pm :: 882 Third Avenue, 10th floor, Brooklyn, NY (Sunset Park).

[image: Chromaccord: The Visual Medium of Kinetic Color by Daniel Conrad]

OptoSonic Tea is a regular series of meetings dedicated to the convergence of live visuals with live sound which focuses on the visual component. These presentation-and-discussion meetings aim to explore different forms of live visuals (live video, live film, live slide projection and their variations and combinations) and the different ways they can come into interaction with live audio. Each evening features two different live visual artists or groups of artists who each perform a set with the live sound artists of their choice. The presentations are followed by an informal discussion about the artists’ practices over a cup of green tea. A third artist, from previous generations of visualists or related fields, is invited specifically to participate in this discussion so as to create a dialogue between current and past practices and provide different perspectives on the present and the future.

Dan Conrad lives in Baltimore. In recent years he has been making “light paintings”, configurations of automatic color-changing light behind a translucent screen. A collection of these works can be seen at www.chromaccord.net . Conrad’s statement for the Optosonic Tea: My interest in color sequencing began in 1968 when I read Josef Albers’ Interaction of Color. In 1971 in San Francisco I built a color sculpture/light machine that changed color using multiple dimmers that were manipulated during a performance. This instrument evolved into the chromaccord color instrument built in 1999. I have performed the chromaccord with a variety of musicians, and silently. Compared to other senses, visual perception has remarkable latency properties that function in space and time. The chromaccord juxtaposes two or more areas of mutable color. At any moment lateral neural responses in the retina create simultaneous contrasts that are characteristic of each color juxtaposition. As colors are altered, afterimage effects cause sequential contrasts that are characteristic of the particular color change. The chromaccord is designed to elicit these visual latency effects, and it relies almost entirely on them for its expression.

Jorge Martins, who was born in Portugal, has been living in Baltimore for three years, where he is active with several forms of music, from improvisation to composition. He describes his approach to performing with Dan Conrad on chromaccord as follows: I will play electric guitar in the style of Lizard Music, the music of a fat lizard in the summer lying on a hot stone, motionless listening. I listen and play after I listen. Listening usually takes me longer than playing. Lizard Music is chord-based without chord progression, away from constant sound.

George O. Stadnik, Lumia Artist. “The science of light inspires my art. My curiosity, discovery, imagination, creativity and discipline transform the cool formulas and calculations of optical physics into a temporal reality of color, motion and emotion. My Lumia artworks are the result of experiments and inspirations across a wide range of media. My formal art education includes a BFA in Experimental Studios from Syracuse University in 1972. From 1976 through 1984, I built a Lumiagraphtm Studio in Worcester, MA. The studio was comprised of a 10′ x 12′ x 8′ light-tight room - a sort of camera obscura. In it, I created still image compositions using discarded industrial optics - dichroic glass, lenses, diffraction gratings, liquids with optical properties. A variety of light sources - tungsten, halogen, laser and even sunlight and moonlight were used. With these simple elements, I created large format Lumia compositions that were recorded as direct, one of a kind, still images onto large sheets of CibaChrometm film. Lumiagraphstm were exhibited in Boston, New York and London. Today, they can be found in private and corporate collections around the world. My original inspiration for this lifetime of work was a Lumia composition, created by Thomas Wilfred called Opus 158, which I saw as an art student in 1968, at MOMA in New York City.The Visual Music of Digital Lumia and Synaesthesia - Digital Lumia owes its very existence to pure inspiration from seeing the work of the 20th Century artist Thomas Wilfred, who invented the art form of Lumia. Mr. Wilfred performed his compositions in Clavilux concerts and exhibited animated versions of his light sculptures, called Clavilux Juniors throughout the United States and Europe. His compositions were silent. They were intended to be experienced as visual music. Mr. Wilfred intended that his audiences interpret the imagery synaesthetically - what the eye saw in the composition, triggered the mind to create the complementary or contrasting sound, flavor, texture or feelings; there were no narratives, although Wilfred’s pieces could evoke fantastic landscapes, futuristic cities, elegant gardens or the most primitive, primal moments. My work builds on this tradition and brings it into a contemporary cultural context to inspire and stimulate each viewer’s imagination to discover and create their own visions, stories and emotions within themselves. Digital Lumia is created using optical simulation algorithms and software to construct virtual optical machines. The elements within each machine are adjusted over time so that a visual sequence of changes in color, refraction, reflection and shadow is composed. The resulting sequence is tested with key frames, it is then rendered in one of several resolution and file formats for output and display. Digital Lumia Compositions are available as high resolution DVDs (movies), or high resolution, archival LightJet prints (still images).” For more information about the Art of Digital Lumia - contact: stadnik@erols.com or visit: http://www.photonlightguitars.com

James Ross is a guitarist and composer living in Brooklyn, NY. Originally from the Pittsburgh, Pa., area, Mr. Ross has studied guitar at the University of Pittsburgh and the Mannes College of Music. He has written music for orchestral and chamber ensembles, electronic works, as well as solo music for the guitar and the zhongruan (a type of Chinese lute). His album, Three Pieces, a combination of environmental sounds, guitars, flutes, voices and electronic drones, can be heard at http://www.archive.org/details/nnm004. He is currently studying North Indian classical music and composition with La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela. Visit http://www.facebook.com/jrossmusic for updates on new recordings, performances and links to more music.

Eric Rosenzveig is an artist who’s collaborative work with Willy LeMaitre straddled the line between sound and image - performed media in the mid-’90’s, then autonomous systems at the end of the decade and finally encompassing consumer electronics as artworks. He currently runs the Center for Audio-Visual Studies Department at FAMU, the National Film School in Prague, CZ.

OptoSonic Tea is organized by Katherine Liberovskaya and Ursula Scherrer. For more information about OptoSonic Tea please go here.