On Saturday, May 9,
Andrei
and I played a show as
REALITY ORP in the Boston area.
In this instance, I performed music, while Andrei performed
live visuals. It's been a while since I did live sound, so I
developed a new setup, which I'll likely continue exploring
for the next few shows we play.
I sampled a small handheld FM radio through a microphone,
scanning through stations until I found a snippet of sound to
loop and process with granular synthesis. I also played the
continuumini, vocals, and kalimba, also with granular
processing. The result is a slowly morphing ambient soundscape
that evolves gradually over time in parallel with Andrei's
visuals.
The two-day event, titled Orbits, was organized by
fellow artists
cskonopka
and
Callie Chapman, who also performed as part of the program. We performed in
a multimedia space that contained a sprung floor for dance,
and multiple projectors facing the walls and floor. The other
performances included interesting combinations of modern dance
movement and interactive projected video.
It was very cool to see these collaborations taking shape, and
to be a part of this exciting synergy. We used multiple
blended projectors to create a widescreen image. Here is a
recording of our set:
Last month, on April 10, Andrei and I led a workshop on Analog
Video Glitch at the
Electronics Faire
at Temple University in Philadelphia. This was our second year
participating in this annual event; last year, I led a
workshop on HTML Journaling. This year, the theme was
repair, which we kind of subverted because our
workshop was more about breaking analog video signals
than repairing them... But in some sense, bringing old video
devices back to life and misusing them is a form of repair, I
think. Anyway, it went well and was a lot of fun. Everyone was
very amused and curious about video hacking and the underlying
technical details.
The rest of the faire was very enjoyable as well! We attended
part of a workshop by
Lee Tusman
about the new
L5 library, and how it relates to topics of repair and permacomputing.
As I did last year, I lurked often at the booth of
Iffy Books, a local bookstore and infoshop in Philly. We saw some cool
art exhibitions and live performances. And I had the
opportunity to see some friends from the Philly area (Sam
and
Richard) — and some
friends from afar
who I didn't expect to run into!
Many thanks to the
organizers
of the E-faire for hosting our workshop, and for facilitating
the photo documentation I've included in this post.
This past weekend, I organized a live show at
Ely Center, a community art space here in New Haven, CT. The impetus
for the show was that two experimental electronic musicians I
know from Worcester, MA were doing a mini tour around the
northeast. I put together a mixed electronic bill, and
performed live video projections throughout the event.
Visiting from Worcester were
RUBY, who refers to her musical practice as 'keymashing' and
performed dancey riffs using an old IBM mechanical keyboard as
a controller, and
Imaginary Prisons, who did a mixture of ambient sound textures, and percussive
segments that bordered on drum and bass, using an open source
node-based daw called
bespoke synth.
Locals joining the bill were
The Herbalists, an epic dungeon synth artist peddling intricate,
fantastical melodies (who also performs under many other
monikers), and
Parlay Droner, who performed hazy lofi psychedelia with an omnichord and
several tape-based machines that I will have to ask him more
about some time.
Considering that I'm still new to New Haven, and don't know
that many people yet, I was a bit nervous about the turnout,
but a good number of people braved the cold weather to join
us. Ely Center's new interim space is really nice for these
sorts of events, and this show was a spiritual participant in
the
Weird Music Night
series also hosted there.
Since I was filling multiple roles at this event (working
door, helping with sound, etc.), I tried to keep my visuals
setup as simple as possible while still remaining dynamic
enough to shift to suit the different vibes of each set. I
didn't use a laptop or resolume this time; the only
"computer" I used was the single-board Jetson Nano
running Andrei's
Artificial Life
video oscillator software. I also used my classic video
feedback rig with a gimball head allowing for rotation of the
camera. Scroll down to the bottom of the image gallery to see
a diagram of my signal chain.
Overall, I felt that the show went really well, and I really
enjoyed all of the sets that we performed. While I don't
organize shows very often, it can be a very rewarding
experience to see how the energy of many people can come
together to make something happen. I'm especially grateful to
the folks at Ely Center for opening their space to us, to
Aude, Ruby, and Drew for the photos and footage, and to Andrei
for helping with literally everything.
A few months ago, a
friend
forwarded me an email of an open call to
Diagram Your Practice. It was published by
ILSSA, which stands for Impractical Labor in Service of the
Speculative Arts. Well, I don't need much of an excuse to make
a diagram, so of course I decided to participate.
I was also excited to learn of the existence of ILSSA, which
describes itself as a union for reflective creative practice,
focusing on the immaterial working conditions of
their members. All are welcome to join, which involves
subscribing to their
listserv
and mailing them a physical letter. They are based not too far
from me in Connecticut, and the
printed materials
they publish are very beautiful, mainly created with
letterpress and risograph. It's no surprise that the main
operators are a book artist and a professor of graphic design.
(Also, their website is a testament to the elegance of minimal
CSS.)
In their open call to submit diagrams, they invite us to:
Diagram your creative practice. Consider practices,
processes, methods, spaces, tools, materials, sources,
influences, histories, places, contexts, communities,
resources... the result may be simple or complex.
Diagram your practice as it currently is. If it is
helpful, consider also speculating on how you would like
it to be.
The end is in the means: what will you discover about your
practice & your process through diagramming it?
The original deadline for the diagrams has passed, but it is
porous and currently extended to March 15, if anyone is
interested in participating. You can view the full open call
here.
For my submission, I drew a diagram in fine-tip marker on an
acrylic-painted sheet of 8 * 12 inch, 3/32" thickness
lauan plywood. I started with the main nodes:
Making art
Documentation
Collaboration
Contemplation
Administration
...And then worked my way out from them / between them. Using
a piece of material with a limited size kept me from going too
far with this, but I could imagine continuing to explode this
diagram until it was the size of a wall, over a longer time
span.
I think the most interesting part that came out of this is the
Venn diagram describing tools made by me vs.
tools made by others. Making tools is a big part of
my art practice, but that can mean a lot of things; most tools
are made with (or within) other tools. I want to write more
about this at some point.
Anyway, my diagram and member letter are in the mail now, and
I hope they arrive safely. I look forward to seeing what
future open calls ILSSA will send out in the future.
I've been meaning to write a year-in-review blog post for 2025
since before the new year. Now, it's 18 days into 2026. That
is approximately 1/20th of a year. In other words, 20 of these
makes 1 year. That feels weird to think about!
I think that I put off writing this until now because,
subconsciously, a part of me did not want to review this past
year. Some things happened that were very tough, both in my
own life and in the world in general. I won't go into detail
about political or economic situations in the United States in
2025, because you either are already aware of them, or can
find out from many other sources. But some of them did affect
me personally in various ways.
Meanwhile, in the comparatively microscopic scale of my own
life, I moved to a new city and executed a job search in a
less-than-ideal market. Then, in the fall, I experienced the
death of a friend, a week of incapacitating illness, and the
engine failure of a vehicle, all within a very short span of
time. While these things were difficult for me, I don't lead
with them to lament, but rather, to acknowledge what happened
and to hold myself with extra gentleness, and appreciate that
I am still here, enjoying life and creating things every day.
Even though I procrastinated this blog post for weeks, a part
of me also knew that it would be helpful to look back and
recall the things that went well over the past year. So I'll
write a bit about those things below.
At the beginning of the year, I spent six weeks doing a
coding retreat at
Recurse Center, where I took time to further develop my programming
skills, met lots of really nice and smart people, and built
a
virtual tarot card app
as well as a variety of little experimental things.
Later in the year, coasting on the high of my programming
work at Recurse Center, I built myself a custom minimalist
journaling app, which runs on a tiny raspberry pi server on
my desk.
I delved further into self-hosting, as well as home
automation, with some more projects that I definitely spent
way too much time on:
Repurposed an e-ink reader as a wall-mounted clock and
live calendar/weather display, through the power of
linux and python.
Started running home assistant, a very powerful open
source home automation app, on a "server" (old
computer) in my home.
Established direct local control of various cheap and
miscellaneous wifi-controlled light bulbs throughout our
home. (No more relying on random companies' cloud
servers and abandonware.)
Set up a network of small battery-powered buttons and
switches, running on the Zigbee radio protocol, which
are linked into Home Assistant to control things in our
home.
Started a new job working at an
art studio, where I learned about (and helped develop) unique
processes for creating mathematical patterns and translating
things between the physical and the digital. Also improved
my skills with woodworking, which I brought into my home
life by making some nice furniture.
The people I work for adopted a puppy named Thor, and I
watch him all the time, so I consider him a little bit my
dog too. I love him and it's so cool to watch him grow up.
Settled into our new home base of New Haven, Connecticut,
met some lovely new people, and set up a home studio that I
really enjoy working in.
Did 4 collaborative performances as
Reality Orp with my partner (in both life and the
band) Andrei. I also did one solo audiovisual performance
and one in collaboration with fellow artist
Lee Tusman. So I played 6 shows in total.
I also did 3 talks/workshops, and had one of my video art
pieces screened in Croatia.
Read 17 books in total. 6 of them were from
The Expanse series by James S. A. Corey, which I
ravenously demolished all of starting in late 2024. And 3
were from the Divine Cities trilogy by Robert
Jackson Bennett.
Watched 90 movies. Um... Wow. Andrei and I have been on a
kick of watching tons of movies together over the past year.
It's a lot of fun.
Started a membership at my local makerspace, where I used
the laser cutter, wood shop, and printmaking studio.
Made and sent out 5 editions of Mystery Objects for
zine club. I also made several
e-zines.
Built some new pages for this website, including
my links page and a new section called
notes.
Moved one of my main email addresses off of Google, and
migrated to a custom email domain, to avoid future lock-in.
It was a lot of work but I finally took the time to do it.
Made a deck of cards of
my creative ideas. This
project straddled the new year, but I'm including it anyway!
Started a biweekly music collaboration project with a
friend, for which I've made 3 songs so far.
Spent time with people I love.
Sometimes, what we say no to can be just as important, or even
more important, than what we do. Whether it's to take time to
rest, or to make more time to work on things I care about,
not doing things is a skill I am learning to value
more and more. So while I'm proud of the things I've done, I
also want to recognize, and even appreciate, the blank spaces
in this list that only I can see: things I chose not to do at
all. I want to be intentional about how I spend my time, and
make sure it aligns with my values. And I think that, over
time, I'm moving in the right direction in that regard.
OK, that's enough reviewing for now. Time to come back to the
present, and see what comes next. Onward!
