Artists Space

Speaker Music: drape over another

Performance & Album Launch
December 13, 2019, 7:30pm

A special event curated by Speaker Music (DeForrest Brown Jr.) entitled drape over another is presented in collaboration with photographer/visual designer Ting Ding and painter Luz Angélica Fernández of the sustainable gender-flexible apparel line Hecha / 做 NYC with Edible Altar by REMEDI FOOD.

drape over another is a performative articulation of Speaker Music’s debut album of desire, longing (Planet Mu), exploring the delicate and poignant qualities of light, sound and taste with a focus on the healing affectual specificity of human tactility and perception. drape over another reconsiders the inherent politics of habitual spaces amid seasonal cycles of consumption, outlining and rejecting the operational failures of a neutralized social sphere.

Accompanied by a book of multi-textural data and rhythm analyses written by Ting Ding and DeForrest Brown Jr. entitled QTRLY Report, drape over another will exhibit Luz Angélica Fernández’s developing live action painting practice of impressing material textures and visual semiotics into fabric. The resulting painting will produce a limited edition Hecha / 做 NYC collection.

The event will be live-streamed and available on Hecha / 做 NYC's website (http://hechanyc.com), and will be on view at Artists Space until Sunday, December 15th.

a finesse (https://youtu.be/cLsrQVmig4o) is a video preview of drape over another filmed by Ting Ding at Artists Space.

Planet Mu (OFFICIAL) will release Speaker Music’s of desire, longing on December 6th, 2019
Pre-order: https://speakermusic.bandcamp.com

A man in t-shirt and fabric harness crouching, face slightly obscured behind metal pipes, wearing a baseball cap saying "MAKE TECHNO BLACK AGAIN"
Speaker Music (DeForrest Brown, Jr.), portrait by Ting Ding, 2019, Shirt & Harness by HECHA / 做. [A man in t-shirt and fabric harness crouching, face slightly obscured behind metal pipes, wearing a baseball cap saying "MAKE TECHNO BLACK AGAIN"]

DeForrest Brown, Jr. is a New York-based rhythmanalyst, media theorist and curator. His work is concerned with speculative futures in performative contexts and programmatic intersections of technology and thought. He also produces digital audio and extended media as Speaker Music as well as being a representative of the Make Techno Black Again campaign. His most recent writing can be found in Afropunk, Artforum, and Hyperallergic. In 2017 he was the inaugural Suzanne Fiol Curatorial Fellow at ISSUE Project Room and he co-produced Ebbing Sounds Symposium with Swiss publication Zweikommasieben and curator Marcella Faustini in May 2018 at Grey Area Art + Technology with support from Swissnex San Francisco. He has presented work at XXII Triennale di Milano, Kunst-Werke Institute for Contemporary Art, Smart Museum of Art, Unsound Krakow, Black Mountain College Museum, WORM Rotterdam, New Museum, MoMAPS1, Artists Space, 92nd Street Y, Abrons Art Center, Signal Gallery, Cafe Oto, E-Flux’s Bar Laika, Public Records and the Weeksville Heritage Center. He is also one half of Elevator to Mezzanine (E-M) with artist and musician Steven Warwick, and most recently released the black comedy mixtape The Wages of Black is Death (PTP) with sound artist Kepla ahead of their research and performance praxis Substantia Nigra.

Ting Ding is a Chinese-Canadian statistical analyst, photographer, and visual designer. As a co-founder of HECHA / 做, Ding’s work considers the material composition of fashion production as well as the marketing and commercialization of the brand. She attended the University of Toronto where she studied Business and Economics (2010). At her hyper-capitalist day job at the language learning app Babbel, Ding collects, interprets and summarizes numerical data into useable, salable business drivers. Her analysis of the impact of changing market circumstances influences her artistic endeavors in the form of a self-designed “empathy-driven” business model, focused on sustainability and the restandardization of industry practices. Ding has also provided visual work in collaboration with composer Kepla and rhythmanalyst DeForrest Brown, Jr. for their mixtape “The Wages of Being Black is Death” and their performance at the XXII Triennale di Milano.

Luz Angélica Fernández is a multidisciplinary artist and native New Yorker whose work bridges the intersections between art, design, and technology. As a co-founder of HECHA / 做, Fernández focuses in the design and production management of the brand, as well as paints the fabric used for the main line garments. The aesthetic Fernández has developed for the fabric is derivative of her action painting practice and inspired by the patterns and textures of materials in natural and artificial settings such as snow, sand, clay, plaster, tar, and wet cement. In her personal body of work, Fernández’s paintings draw on both the origins of abstract expressionism and the semiotics of the internet age, the titles of which often evoke the social-media informed modes of communication now commonplace in everyday life. Through her works Fernández channels memory and emotion by creating metaphor and building textural color worlds from her immediate experiences.

REMEDI FOOD was founded with the intention of making real, nutritionally bountiful food accessible to New Yorkers of varied socioeconomic backgrounds, especially those find solace and liberation in nightlife. Instead of framing nightlife with substance-fueled debauchery and submitting to nihilism swarming around the future of our planet, we hope to utilize these moments of communal catharsis to remind each other of the role we play in our global ecosystem. The name Remedi was inspired by the practice of bio(remedi)ation, the act of restoring polluted soil with the introduction of helpful microorganisms. We aim to be organisms that help remediate the soil of the human condition that causes our planet and people harm.

Half-eaten fruit, chocolate, candles, and grape leaves sit on a low, stone tabletop under dim lighting.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [Half-eaten fruit, chocolate, candles, and grape leaves sit on a low, stone tabletop under dim lighting.]
A figure in overalls reaches up to pin a dark tarp along the length of a wall. Behind them, another figure adjusts a camera on a tripod.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [A figure in overalls reaches up to pin a dark tarp along the length of a wall. Behind them, another figure adjusts a camera on a tripod.]
A crowd of people fill a dimly lit red room, some sitting and some standing. Abstract images are projected on the space’s walls.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [A crowd of people fill a dimly lit red room, some sitting and some standing. Abstract images are projected on the space’s walls.]
A crowd of people fill a dimly lit red room, some sitting and some standing. Projections of abstract images and an illuminated painting cover three of the space’s walls.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [A crowd of people fill a dimly lit red room, some sitting and some standing. Projections of abstract images and an illuminated painting cover three of the space’s walls.]
A figure in overalls leans forward to paint broad strokes of lighter paint on a black tarp hung on a wall. Painting supplies sit on a table directly behind them.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [A figure in overalls leans forward to paint broad strokes of lighter paint on a black tarp hung on a wall. Painting supplies sit on a table directly behind them.]
A figure stands next to a fold-out table in a dimly lit space. They look down at their feet while their hand rests at their hip.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [A figure stands next to a fold-out table in a dimly lit space. They look down at their feet while their hand rests at their hip.]
The bright beams of a projector cut through the fog filling a basement room. An image is projected onto one of the space’s walls. Several figures talk to each other in the background.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [The bright beams of a projector cut through the fog filling a basement room. An image is projected onto one of the space’s walls. Several figures talk to each other in the background.]
A figure stands facing a black tarp tacked to the wall. A second figure holds a camera, photographing the tarp. An image is projected on the back wall.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [A figure stands facing a black tarp tacked to the wall. A second figure holds a camera, photographing the tarp. An image is projected on the back wall.]
A figure in a baseball cap stands beside a table covered in scattered drinks and a laptop, typing on the computer’s keys.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [A figure in a baseball cap stands beside a table covered in scattered drinks and a laptop, typing on the computer’s keys.]
A figure looks into the viewfinder of a camera. In the background, an abstract image is projected onto a wall.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [A figure looks into the viewfinder of a camera. In the background, an abstract image is projected onto a wall.]
A figure kneels beside a table and traces their finger along the screen of an iPad. They wear a baseball cap that reads “MAKE TECHNO BLACK AGAIN.”
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [A figure kneels beside a table and traces their finger along the screen of an iPad. They wear a baseball cap that reads “MAKE TECHNO BLACK AGAIN.”]
Two figures stand facing one another, smiling. One wears a baseball cap and the other holds a camera.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [Two figures stand facing one another, smiling. One wears a baseball cap and the other holds a camera.]
Several figures fill a dimly lit, basement room. Some figures sit and talk on large couches, while others stand and talk to each other. Video projections play on two of the space’s walls.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [Several figures fill a dimly lit, basement room. Some figures sit and talk on large couches, while others stand and talk to each other. Video projections play on two of the space’s walls.]
A figure in overalls spreads paint over a dark tarp hung against a white wall. The length of the tarp is covered with wide strokes of lighter paint.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [A figure in overalls spreads paint over a dark tarp hung against a white wall. The length of the tarp is covered with wide strokes of lighter paint.]
Half-eaten fruit, chocolate, and candles sit on a low, stone tabletop under dim lighting.
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. Photo © 2019 Paula Court. [Half-eaten fruit, chocolate, and candles sit on a low, stone tabletop under dim lighting.]
Speaker Music: drape over another. Performance & Album Launch documentation, December 13, 2019, Artists Space. [A person plays music and wanders around the room. Scenes of food, video projections with people dancing and crowds mingling are intercut throughout.]

Lead support

VIA Art Fund

Support

The Friends of Artists Space, The Artists Space Program Fund, Atelier4, The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, The Greenwich Collection LTD, Lambent Foundation Fund of Tides Foundation, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature, Patina Rentals.

    An image is reproduced from three different angles: two in landscape with the third, vertical and upside down. Two people stand in a red-lit room, one looks at a camera and the other stands beside them. A double exposure overlays the image with the same two people, the former holding up the camera and the latter posing for a photo.
    Speaker Music, still from a finesse, 2019, (filmed at 11 Cortlandt Alley). [An image is reproduced from three different angles: two in landscape with the third, vertical and upside down. Two people stand in a red-lit room, one looks at a camera and the other stands beside them. A double exposure overlays the image with the same two people, the former holding up the camera and the latter posing for a photo.]