Immersion Program: somewhere between the dust and the light

Opening reception Friday, November 13 from 7-10 PM with music performance by Métal Rouge

Immersion Program: somewhere between the dust and the light from Summercamp ProjectProject on Vimeo.

Summercamp's Project Project presents Immersion Program: somewhere between the dust and the light, a video exhibition featuring works projected on the ceiling by James Boulton, Spencer Douglass & Gustavo Herrera, Matt MacFarland, Kayo Nakamura, Telefantasy Studios, Kai Vierstra, with Tarra Stevenson from Reading Radio in Guestroom. Music by Métal Rouge. Organized by Fatima Hoang, Elonda Billera, and Janice Gomez.

The Lost Artworks, an ongoing project by Matt MacFarland, addresses the interdependence of opposing terms such as success and failure, life and death and tragedy and comedy.  The series investigates cliché comedic tropes as a reminder of our humanity and vulnerability. Undertaking mortality through humor MacFarland's work acknowledges that no matter what we do, everything is futile, insignificant and simultaneously significant because we will not be around for long.  Spencer Douglass and Gustavo Herrera's video, American stars and Mars, is an interpretation of the classic Neil Young album American Stars and Bars- specifically the photograph on the album cover. The video activates this still image in an exploration of excess and the 'morning after'. The morning after a night a week a month a year of heady indulgence and blind consumption.

Telefantasy Studios is dedicated to the creation of realms full of alternate realities populated with extravagantly and exactingly created beings. Creators, Jennifer Juniper Stratford and Christine Adolph, explore the theme of fantasy and memories of forgotten futures in their most recent series The Multinauts via an innovative mix of creature and miniature model making with 2D animation.  Episodic story lines follow three heroes through time and space as they battle The Norks, a mutant empire hell bent on creating chaos in a post nuke universe.   In contrast, Kayo Nakamura pairs subtle movements with sentimental songs  to create poetic moments out of unassuming situations.

James Boulton's staccato animations isolate and collage together real world images with patterns, sounds, and drawings.  Using a vibrant saturated palette, Boulton's video alternates between optically blending and clashing sounds.   Kai Vierstra's Hammering Nails also uses manipulation of audio.  As a loose continuation of  his father’s wave research with MIT/Lincoln Laboratory’s group 38 “Air Defense Systems”, Viestra experiments with slow and low frequencies that could induce a bodily reaction indicated by the lycanthropic phenomenon.

In addition to the multiple timed video screenings,  Tarra Stevenson of Reading Radio will address a different analog(ue) realm of the time based program by utilizing the natural ebb and flow of reading aloud.

Métal Rouge was formed in 2006 by Helga Fassonaki and Andrew Scott in Auckland, New Zealand with no aim but to open themselves to the spontaneous psych tonalism running through the underbelly of popular music like a vein of pure lightning.  Birthed from the rich history of New Zealand underground they began to mold a sound comprised equally of the forward motion of ecstatic jazz and the drugged stasis of NYC loft minimalism circa ’66.  Using electric guitar, vocals and amplified santur as their primary instruments, they forged a new vocabulary of unrefined free spiritual music. Relocating to Los Angeles, they toured the US, adding lap steel and pedal steel to their arsenal.   Drummer/Trombonist Caitlin M. Mitchell joined in 2009, bringing with her a night/day spectrum ranging from pure brass drone through to aggressive free rock.