Writer/curator Cathy Byrd sparks conversations about today’s art, design, and film on the Fresh Art International podcast. Synthesizing interviews and field recordings with critical commentary since 2011, the podcast archives the voices, sounds, and stories of contemporary culture makers from around the world.
Episodes
Monday Jul 30, 2018
Monday Jul 30, 2018
Egyptian artist Magdi Mostafa's interactive environment for the 2018 Dakar Biennial of Contemporary African Art turns the sounds of analog technology into a vibrating aesthetic force. Acting like tiny radio receivers, his handmade electronics make audible the otherwise silent electro-magnetic fields emanating from today’s myriad digital devices. He exposes the reverberations of energy emission and loss in our battery powered, wi-fi connected contemporary communications.
In “Transmission Loss,” electronic residue becomes the main signal—the core source of energy for an audio playscape. Mostafa invites us to turn a field of full frequency noise into a sonic composition. By tweaking the dials of tone generators and manipulating vibrating devices, we can alter sounds, discover patterns and explore the mysterious interactions of feedback and inter-device communication.
Sound Editor: Jonathan Pfeffer | Special Audio and Photos courtesy Magdi Mostafa
Related Episodes:
Samson Young Presents Hong Kong Mixtape
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Monday Jul 23, 2018
Monday Jul 23, 2018
Hong Kong Mixtape introduces our first guest producer: composer and artist Samson Young, and the sound art community of Southeastern China. Young orients us to a set of nine compositions with sonic program notes.
Hong Kong—a vibrant, densely populated urban center, a major port and a global financial hub—offers rich source material. Artist composers take us to the heart of student-led street protests during Hong Kong’s 2014 Umbrella Movement*, invite us to feel the vibrations of traffic lights and trams, immerse us in a traditional funeral ceremony and share the sensation of abstract computer-generated hip-hop.
Samson Young’s personal field recordings capture site-specific sounds far from Hong Kong—the singsong of a North Carolina tobacco auctioneer and a peacock clock inside the Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia.
The set of short compositions will be broadcast on radio stations in Canada, the U.S. and the U.K., and released as a podcast episode on multiple internet platforms, including Fresh Art International.
Sound artist composers and their works, in order of appearance:
Joyce Tang: Gloucester Road; Larry Shuen, Gynopedi No 1 Remix; Austin Yip, Philosophy One–Microsecond; Edwin Lo, Rabbit Travelogue: Central Region (Excerpt); Lee Cheng, Tram Ride on Sunday Afternoon; Alex Yiu, Alter ego (stereo mix); Samson Young, Tobacco Song and Peacock Clock; Fiona Lee, Tide
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio | Special Audio Sources noted above | Images courtesy Contemporary Musiking Hong Kong
Related Episodes: Samson Young on Songs for Disaster Relief; Every Time A Ear Di Soun; Stephen Vitiello on Sound Art
Related Links: Contemporary Musiking Hong Kong, Samson Young, Umbrella Movement
*More on Hong Kong's Umbrella Movement of 2014, rephrased from The Guardian : Hong Kong's so-called “umbrella revolution” turned the city’s gleaming central business district into a virtual conflict zone, replete with shouting mobs, police in riot gear, and clouds of tear gas. Tens of thousands of Hong Kong residents – young and old, rich and poor – peacefully occupied major thoroughfares across the city, shuttering businesses and bringing traffic to a halt. They claimed that Beijing reneged on an agreement to grant them open elections by 2017, and demand “true universal suffrage.”
In October 2017, CNN reported the Umbrella Movement's return: Almost three years to the day after the 2014 Umbrella Movement shut down parts of Hong Kong, thousands of people once again took to the streets. As the city's government marked the 68th anniversary of the People's Republic of China, protesters wearing black braved stifling heat and pouring rain to call for the release of "political prisoners" jailed last month, including Umbrella leaders Joshua Wong, Nathan Law and Alex Chow. Those arrests marked a turnaround from 2014, when the trio helped bring out hundreds of thousands of people to the streets to call for a more direct form of democracy in the former British colony.
Monday Jul 16, 2018
Monday Jul 16, 2018
At the 57th Venice Art Biennale, Miami-based curator Tami Katz-Freiman guides us through the multi-media installation that artist Gal Weinstein created for the Israeli Pavilion. The artist used glue, mold, metal, and felt to transform the shining white cube into a monument to decay.
As you listen the conversation we recorded in 2017, keep in mind the mounting tensions in the Middle East today. Consider the larger question of how nations choose to represent themselves in the context of a high profile international art biennial. Weinstein's project reveals the enduring power of art to serve as portent and marker of change.
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio | Images: Courtesy Israeli Pavilion and Fresh Art International
Related episodes: Sounds of the Venice Art Biennale 2017, Lisa Reihanna on Reversing the Colonial Gaze, Samson Young on Songs for Disaster Relief
Related links: Israeli Pavilion at the 57th Venice Art Biennale, Gal Weinstein, Tami Katz-Freiman
Monday Jul 09, 2018
Monday Jul 09, 2018
What happens outside the art scene inspires many of today’s curators, filmmakers and artists. They mine the conceptual depth of personal and communal rituals and routines. Community gardens, shared ride systems, public processionals, weathervanes, home improvement projects, live streaming radio and selfies on the internet are just a few of the subjects and sites of their research, commentary and engagement. Projects that elevate our view of the everyday reveal life as an art form—translating the mundane into the extraordinary.
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio | Special Audio: Camionnette Chérie, original sound by Claudette et Ti Pièrre; TET CHAJE, mix by Michelange Quay; David Walters, Mesi Bondye; Yosvany Terry, Conga Reversible
Related Episodes:
Marcus Gammel (2107), Skulptur Projekte Münster 2017, Sounds of Miami Art Week (2016), New Performance Art (2016), Cesar Cornejo (2015), Jllian Mayer (2014)
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Monday Jul 02, 2018
Monday Jul 02, 2018
Around the world, a growing number of listeners are falling in love with internet radio on-demand. Audio programs on a range of subjects are easy to access on laptops, computers and mobile devices. You can listen for free to podcasts in more than 100 languages. Among early adopters of the medium (we've been podcasting since 2011), Fresh Art International is one of 500,000 shows in this growing field.
We launched Fresh Art International to fill the gap in public awareness of contemporary art and culture. Our Miami-based podcast explores the center and fringe of art scenes across six continents and the Caribbean Archipelago. Fresh Art International is building a diverse oral history of contemporary art, film and architecture. We design listening experiences to stimulate, inform and inspire you for decades to come.
In the studio at Jolt Radio, Miami, we introduce four young podcasts that delve into local art and culture: Meet Them Mondays, with Christian Portilla; Kidnapped for Dinner, with Kristen Soller; Art&Company, with Alette Simmons-Jimenez; and Sunday Painter, with Alex Nuñez. Find out how and why they create their Miami-centric podcasts, what subjects interest them, and most important—when and where you can listen.
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio | Images Courtesy Our Guests
Special Sound and Related Links: Meet Them Mondays, Kidnapped for Dinner, Art&Company, Sunday Painter
Monday Jun 25, 2018
Monday Jun 25, 2018
Activism has long been a way for artists and curators, writers and filmmakers to engage with global flashpoints, inspiring new perspectives on visible and unseen causes. Over the last century, public interventions, performative protests, and works created for public marches and events have led communities to participate in art experiences and make art themselves.
The Me Too Movement, Black Lives Matter, Dreamers and Climate Change Activists expose sexual harassment and assault, race-based violence, immigrant rights violations, and the impact of sea level rise. The issues have energized today’s culture production. Contemporary artists and curators increasingly lead and invite calls to action in response to these vital concerns.
Voices in this conversation: Andrea Bowers, Ralph Rugoff, Catherine Morris, Gary Carrion-Murayari, Manolis D. Lemos, Tania Bruguera, Maria Elena Ortiz, Maria Alyokina
Sound Editor: Julien Borrelli | Special Audio: Andrea Bowers, Manolis D. Lemos, Pussy Riot | Photography: Credits in captions
Related episodes: Andrea Bowers on Environmental Activism, Ralph Rugoff on the 13th Lyon Biennial, Catherine Morris and A Year Of Yes, Tania Bruguera on Art Activism, Maria Aloykhina on Political Art
Related links: Agora, The Highline, New York; Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminism Art, Brooklyn Museum; Songs for Sabotage, New Museum, Sala de Arte Público Siquieros
Monday Jun 18, 2018
Monday Jun 18, 2018
Dancer choreographer Jenny Larsson enlivens our understanding of how the Far North's deep cold is essential to the balance of the Earth's biosphere. With the group known as Wild Beast Collective, she creates the interpretive dance performance Searching for Arctic Winter.
“In the winters up in the arctic when there’s no sunlight and no snow to reflect the moon, all that’s left is darkness. It’s a scary thought, these weather changes…”
Born in Sweden and based in Miami, Larsson is artistic director of the multidisciplinary international collective that hosts an annual residency in Florida. Wild Beast’s mission is to explore, stretch and deepen the experience of contemporary art by presenting site-specific projects and staging free public events to connect with local communities. Environmental issues inform and influence their work.
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio | Special Audio: Wild Beast Collective
Related Episodes: Deborah Mitchell: The Artists as Guide to the Everglades, Art and the Rising Sea, Adam Nadel on Getting the Water Right, Jorge Menna Barreto on Environmental Sculpture, Rauschenberg Residency on Rising Water, Artist Residency in Everglades, Andrea Bowers on Environmental Activism
Related Links: Jenny Larsson, Wild Beast Collective
Monday Jun 11, 2018
Monday Jun 11, 2018
From inside Centro Léon, Santiago, Dominican Republic, we introduce Tilting Axis, a roving arts initiative that aims to bridge the geopolitical gap between Caribbean territories by sparking creative collaborations and cultivating cultural connectivity. Organizers Annalee Davis, Natalie Urquhart, Sara Hermann and Joel Butler talk about the genesis of Tilting Axis, why they're here and what will unfold during the fourth annual gathering.
About Tilting Axis 4: The 2018 convening in the Dominican Republic is a collaboration with the curatorial studies program Curando Caribe and two institutions — Centro León, Santiago, and Centro Cultural de España, Santo Domingo. Exploring the theme Caribbean Cultural Ecologies: Connecting Pasts, Presents and Futures, artists, curators, stakeholders, instigators and activists debate ideas about the Caribbean’s interdependent future, reimagining their collective potential.
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio | Special Audio: Sandra Vivas, After LaMonte Young
Related Links:
Monday Jun 04, 2018
Monday Jun 04, 2018
Today, we take you to meet to artist Deborah Mitchell in her studio on Miami Beach, to talk about the ways that Florida’s southwest coast inspires her. The contested landscape, endangered by encroaching urban development and sea level rise, is where she engages as an artist and an advocate for North America’s only subtropical wilderness: The Everglades. Mitchell’s mindful practice expresses her affinity for this fragile ecology, and her desire to learn, share and preserve its science and history.
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio | Special Audio: Deborah Mitchell | Photographs courtesy the artist and Fresh Art International
Related links: The Everglades, Big Cypress, Deborah Mitchell, Artists in Residence In Everglades (AIRIE)
Monday May 28, 2018
Monday May 28, 2018
Curators and artists whose passion is social engagement share their experiments in relational aesthetics—participatory performances, interactive installations, community events, and inside/outside exhibitions—invite viewers to become co-creators, to take ownership in the creative process.
Curators Jochen Volz (São Paulo Biennial, Live Uncertainty, 2016), Susan Cross (Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, Material World, 2010-2011, The Workers, 2011-2012), James Voorhies (Bureau of Open Culture, MASS MoCA, The Workers) and Stephanie Smith (SMART Museum of Art, FEAST, 2012, and Institute for Contemporary Art, Richmond, Declaration, 2018) share their perspectives, as do artists William Pope.L (Baile, 2016), Theaster Gates (Soul Food Pavilion, 2012) and Marinella Senatore (Estman Radio, ongoing).
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio
Special Audio:
William Pope.L, Baile, São Paulo Biennial
There Is Only Light (We Do Not Know What To Do With Other Worlds) performance-reading, July 2011, MASS MoCA. Produced by Bureau for Open Culture
Theaster Gates, FEAST, SMART Museum of Art, University of Chicago
Marinella Senatore and Estman Radio recording, courtesy Marinella Senatore and Virginia Commonwealth University Institute for Contemporary Art
Related Links:
Live Uncertainty, Material World, The Workers: Precarity/Invisibility/Mobility, FEAST: Radical Hospitality in Contemporary Art, Declaration, Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation Exhibition Award, Exhibitions on the Cusp