January 11, 2018, 8pm
Artists Space welcomes White Mountain Apache composer, musician and artist Laura Ortman and Tuscarora singer Jennifer Kreisberg for a special evening of solo and collaborative musical performances that intervene in the exhibition Unholding.
A soloist and a vibrant collaborator, Laura Ortman works across recorded albums, live performances, and filmic and artistic soundtracks, and has collaborated with artists such as Tony Conrad, Jock Soto, Raven Chacon, Nanobah Becker, Okkyung Lee, Martin Bisi, Caroline Monnet, Michelle Latimer, Alan Michelson, and Martha Colburn. An inquisitive and exquisite violinist, Ortman is versed in Apache violin, piano, electric guitar, keyboards, and pedal steel guitar, often sings through a megaphone, and is a producer of capacious field recordings. She has performed at The Whitney Museum of American Art and The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Musée d’Art Contemporain de Montréal, and the Centre Pompidou, Paris, among countless established and DIY venues in the US, Canada, and Europe.
In 2008 Ortman founded the Coast Orchestra, an all-Native American orchestral ensemble that performed a live soundtrack to Edward Curtis’s film In the Land of the Head Hunters (1914), the first silent feature film to star an all-Native American cast. Ortman is the recipient of the 2017 Jerome Foundation Fellowship, the 2016 Art Matters Grant, the 2016 Native Arts and Cultural Foundation Fellowship, the 2015 IAIA’s Museum of Contemporary Native Arts Social Engagement Resident and the 2014/15 Rauschenberg Residency.
Jennifer Kreisberg is a singer, composer, producer, teacher, and activist who has performed at the Carnegie Hall, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, The Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of the American Indian, The Olympics, and elsewhere. She is a member of the critically acclaimed Native women's trio Ulali. Kreisberg is frequently called upon to guest lecture and conduct vocal workshops at universities and schools, in Native communities and at festivals throughout the United States and Canada. She has worked in film and television and has toured with renowned musicians throughout the world.
Laura Ortman & Jennifer Kreisberg is organized in conjunction with the exhibition Unholding (November 19, 2017 – January 21, 2018).
