Wave Farm's 2019

Resident Artists and Projects Announced

Selected from 104 applications originating from 17 countries and 22 U.S. states we are delighted to welcome the following artists and projects, in chronological order, to Wave Farm for residencies taking place between June and October this year.

Kathy Kennedy (Montreal, Canada)—Radio Dialogues

Radio Dialogues is a daily ritual conducted over seven days while in-residence at Wave Farm. Two low power transmitters and radio receivers are positioned just outside of normal "earshot" range from one another. On one end is Kennedy and on the other a Hudson Valley-based collaborating artist. Two-way radio transmission unites the otherwise physically isolated artists in time and place and provides a framework for improvisational and site-specific performance.

Kathleen McDermott (Brooklyn/Troy, NY)—The Public Speaker

A new project in McDermott’s wearable technology Urban Armor series, The Public Speaker is a skirt covered in 50 small speakers, which have been individually soldered to mini-amplifiers. A base skirt layer is covered in strips of LED lights, creating a soft glow behind the speakers, which pulses in time to audio frequencies. At Wave Farm, The Public Speaker will be transformed into an interactive walking radio receiver, tuned to overlooked and underheard frequencies, revealing invisible networks wherever she goes.

Stefana Fratila (Toronto, Canada)—Mid-Orbit: A Radio Sitcom About the 8 Planets

Mid-Orbit: A Radio Sitcom About the 8 Planets is a radio play based on the planets in our solar system. Inspired by the planetary orbits and their associated mythologies, this radio piece playfully mixes classic sitcom tropes and sound effects, loveable and archetypical characters, and ambient music. This situational comedy utilizes radio waves and transmission frequencies from the planets themselves, as well existing data about their various atmospheres to generate the accompanying score. Curiously, in this sitcom the Earth is stricken with a case of laryngitis and remains silent throughout, which begs the question— what happens when we simply listen?

Stephen Bradley (Catonsville, MD) and Edward Ruchalski (Syracuse, NY)—SpiderCricket (Sp+Cr)

Stephen Bradley and Edward Ruchalski’s SpiderCricket (Sp+Cr) is a multi-phonic ecological radio installation informed by Wave Farm’s biophonic and radiophonic soundscape. The core of Sp+Cr uses a “spider web” wind-harp structure, which also functions as an antenna for low-power FM transmitters that broadcast on the property. Using DIY micro-mixers, numerous solar-powered FM radio receivers are tuned to one of the broadcast channels. Each wire’s unique length is tuned to a particular frequency that mixes with other sonic algorithms. Field recordings made during the dawn and dusk cycles are incorporated into Sp+Cr sculpture and into the final, live WGXC radio broadcast.  

Bob Drake (Cleveland, OH)—RC (Radio Control)

RC (Radio Control) is a collaborative performance system for multiple movement artists and software defined radios (SDRs). The system enables performers to adjust the tuning and other parameters of the SDRs based on their location within the performance space and position. Video cameras aimed at the performance area feed images to a motion tracking patch in Max (software), generating location information which will be scaled and sent to the SDRs via OSC messages, controlling their tuning. Performers will have individual choreography instructions for the piece; some will be attempting to control the sounds of the radio in a specified sequence, others will have movement instructions based on the sounds they hear.

Samuel Hertz (Berlin, Germany / Washington D.C.) and Carmelo Pampillonio (Asheville, NC)—Librations (pictured above.)

Samuel Hertz and Carmelo Pampillonio’s Librations is a performance/composition using a radio communications relay, which transmits signals to the Moon, that are then reflected back to Earth—a moonbounce. Librations is realized in cooperation with broadcast engineers at the Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute (PARI) in Rosman, North Carolina. Culminating in a composition, radio broadcast, and multi-media essay, the artists’ collaboration throughout the residency period stands as an open field of negotiations between the Earth, the Moon, and the sonic/energetic traces reflected between them.

Lucy Helton (Brooklyn, NY)—WEFAX (Weather, Water and Climate Prediction)

The radio WEFAX is a receptive instrument that converts numerical weather data, transmitted from dedicated stations, into visual form. At Wave Farm, Helton will continue her practice with image transmission using low energy radio waves with these devices, extending her meditations on the future state of the environment. In our current period of great meteorological and climate disturbance, the weather forecast plays a major role in the prediction, detection, and mitigation of the negative effect of natural disasters. During her time at Wave Farm, Helton will transmit via radio frequency, images of accelerated environmental change creating an installation of radio weather faxes and their output.

Milad H. Mozari (Chicago, IL)—The Birdwatcher (title pending)

The Birdwatcher (title pending) is a radio drama that will be adapted for an experimental short film about Reza Tabatabaei. In 1980, Reza, Mozari’s uncle, was jailed for reading a poem at the funeral of a political protester and neighbor after the Iranian Revolution. Before this incident, he was a radio broadcaster in Iran for 24 years. The majority of his archives are gone since raids to his house and him passing away in 2015. Reza had a particular fondness for nature, and also shared a love for birds with his wife. Whenever the two would get into a fight, Reza would bring a canary bird home as a form of an apology. At one point, they housed 46 canaries and a Cockatoo parrot in their home. Mozari’s sound sketch will inform his future film. The cacophony of birds over the radio, field recordings mixed with wind shear, and the voice of a narrator will comprise the key elements of the radio drama.

Grant Smith and Sam Baraitser Smith (London, UK)—Acoustic Commons

The Acoustic Commons describes a range of work that deals with the close association between sounds and places. This includes “environmental” broadcasting, sound mapping, and the development of new “transmission ecologies” making links between very local projects in urban, rural, and peri-urban areas. It also refers to a work in progress which invites people to open places as sites for listening. While in residence, the artists will set up a new permanent live audio stream, placing environmental sounds from the Wave Farm property in the public domain, and designate it as an experimental site of of the Acoustic Commons (AC Experimental Site 0_). A newly designed streambox will be installed to transmit the sounds to a live soundmap at Locus Sonus (http://locusonus.org/soundmap). Drawings on paper and online and a booklet (working title: (un)Manifest(o) for Acoustic Commoning) will document the project.

The New York State Council on the Arts Electronic Media & Film Program in Partnership with Wave Farm:
Media Arts Assistance Fund (MAAF) for Artists

2019 Completion Support and Distribution/Exhibition Support Grantees

COMPLETION SUPPORT GRANTEES AND PROJECT DESCRIPTIONS
 
Annie Berman—The Faithful
The Faithful is a feature length essay film exploring the enduring phenomenon of three global icons: Elvis Presley, Pope John Paul II, and Princess Diana. Launched by the discovery of a Pope lollipop for sale at the Vatican, the filmmaker embarks on what will become an obsessive 20-year journey to the annual memorials of these icons documenting the rites and rituals of their followers, in this meditation on fans, faith, and image. MAAF funding will support the sound design, mix, and voice-over recording.  
 
Peter Burr—Dirtscraper
Dirtscraper is a room-sized computer simulation of an underground structure whose “smart architecture” is overseen by artificial intelligences—spatial and social designers that observe, learn, and make changes to the system. Unaware of the control exerted by these entities, residents move through spaces that reflect varied economies and class hierarchies. Over the course of its lifetime, we may observe the corrosion of this zone, the decay of its philosophy, and the solitary voice of its caretaker trapped in the contradiction between her health and the societal demands placed upon her. MAAF funding will support the completion of single-channel film format of Dirtscraper, formatted to a cinemascope Digital Cinema Package with 5.1 surround sound.
 
Sofian Khan—An Act of Worship
An Act of Worship is a feature length documentary currently in post-production. The diverse team of Muslim filmmakers have followed Muslim-American female activists around the country over the past two years, in this timely meditation on the country’s current political climate. Each of the women featured in the film build on themes of resistance, community and the personal experience of Islamophobia that they share as their lives and stories intersect.
 
Laura Kraning—Terra
Terra builds upon the kinetic immersive exploration of Kraning’s previous archival project Meridian Plain, mining the slips between stillness and motion, time and space, but filming her own earthly images of ecological forms and textures. Exploring the forests and glacial debris of Western New York, as well as a unique fossil park, and industrial mineral quarry, Terra will reveal invisible histories imbedded in the strata of precambrian stone, the tentacles of molds and lichen, and the imprints of ecological time writing intricate patterns across the surfaces of living and decaying trees. MAAF funding will support the necessary tools for completion.
 
Madsen Minax—North By Current
Filmmaker Madsen Minax returns to his rural Michigan hometown following the death of his infant niece and the wrongful arrest of his brother-in-law. Through first-person cinema vérité and genre-bending storytelling, Madsen navigates a town steeped in opioid addiction, economic depression, and religious fervor, while using the act of filmmaking to rebuild familial bonds and reimagine justice. Posing empathy as a tool for creating a more just world, North By Current creates a relentless portrait of an enduring pastoral family, poised to reframe and reimagine narratives about incarceration, addiction, trans embodiment, and ruralness. MAAF funding will support consulting editors and color grading services.
 
Robert Nideffer—12 Years in Azeroth: A Case Study
12 Years in Azeroth: A Case Study is an ethnographic account of a subject who's spent more than a decade immersed, at times casually and at times competitively, in the online role-playing game "World of Warcraft." Authored as an electronic book/game, it deals with co-mingled realities, and explores a range of topics including work, play, relationships, illness, death and dying. What exists as a 750+ page written text will be finalized by end of summer 2019, and the first playable level of the game (which requires completion to access following sections of the written text) will be completed soon after with programming assistance made possible by MAAF support. Electronic distribution is planned for late 2019/early 2020.
 
Andrea Steves—Trinity Downwinders: Audio Countermonument
In collaboration with the Trinity Downwinders—victims and survivors of the world’s first atomic bomb test—and their organization, the New Mexico-based Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium, Steves has been working for the past year with a multidisciplinary team of artists and scholars to collect oral histories. Using these histories, archival material, and other recorded sound, Audio Countermonument will be comprised of transmission-based monuments to commemorate the 1945 test and to document ongoing impacts on the New Mexico community. MAAF support will enable editing support and supplies.
 
Sasha Wortzel—This is an Address I, II
This is an Address I, II is a two-channel video installation that archives queer space and meditates on care networks, interdependence, world-making and un-making in relation to the ongoing, entangled impact of HIV/AIDS and gentrification on the landscape of New York City. Support from the Media Arts Assistance Fund will go towards completing the score, sound mix, and title design for the artwork. This is an Address I,II will be presented in the exhibition Nobody Promised You Tomorrow: Art 50 Years After Stonewall at the Brooklyn Museum (New York) from May 3 through December 8, 2019.  
 
DISTRIBUTION/EXHIBITION SUPPORT GRANTEES AND PROJECT DESCRIPTIONS
 
Flatsitter—El Ramo
El Ramo—The latest virtual reality experience from artist Flatsitter—is an intense and visceral short film paired with virtual reality and was produced entirely in Oaxaca, México in collaboration with a team of Oaxacan artists, musicians, actors, and writers—including the powerful music of Ensamble Kafka. The US premiere of El Ramo will take place on a month-long tour of New York State and will include stops in Buffalo, Corning, Binghamton, Syracuse, the Hudson Valley, and New York City—with a focus on engaging Latino audiences in New York by partnering with arts and cultural organizations working in these communities.
 
Sarah Friedland—CROWDS
A three-channel video installation of a durational dance, CROWDS investigates the choreography of crowd typologies and the slippages between them.  Focusing on collective formations, movements, and gestures, CROWDS uses dance to interrogate the distinctions we make and to destabilize the relationship between ideologies and moving bodies. It attempts to articulate the embedded choreographic register of our political discourses and polemics, reflecting what is amassed and what is lost as we gather and disperse. MAAF funding will support exhibitions in New York City and State, preservation, and publishing online.
 
Michelle Handelman—Hustlers & Empires
Hustlers & Empires is a moving image installation that interweaves the stories of three hustlers who each find themselves pushed out of their own game and forced to confront what their lives have become. It looks at transgression as a mode of survival, examining the complicated relationship between pleasure and risk, and how identity is formed in resistance to oppression. The project will be distributed through gallery and museum installations (upcoming April 18 - May 26, 2019 at signs and symbols, NYC,) live performances, and a vinyl/digital release of the original songs written by John Kelly, Shannon Funchess, and Viva Ruiz, along with a companion book featuring monologues, notes, and production stills from the project.
 
Victoria Manganiello—Computer 1.0
Opening May 17, 2019 at MAD Museum in New York, NY, Studio Focus: Victoria Manganiello features work from a new project by the artist entitled Computer 1.0 created in collaboration with designer Julian Goldman. Computer 1.0  is a textile woven by the artist's hand using hollow polymer tubing and cotton thread. A patterned series of colored liquid and air is pumped into the hollow tubes in a sequence dictated by an Arduino micro-controller creating sound, movement, and light in the form of a lo-fi textile screen. Conceptually exploring the history of the computer and humanity’s relationship to it, this representation of our digital heritage recalls current topics of data, privacy, and communication infrastructure.
 
John Morton—Fever Songs
Fever Songs is an interactive public sound installation project that brings together the vocal traditions of many religions, creating an active sonic experience that explores spiritual commonality and seeks to break down religious divisions. The work is a commingling of ritual and scriptural vocalization, recorded live whenever possible, woven together and sonically altered by ever-changing computer processing and sensor-proximity location. The installation is devoid of doctrine - rather, a bringing together of the commonality of the human ecstatic experience. MAAF funding will support new technology of proximity sensing that will simplify and expedite the distribution and exhibition of Fever Songs, which will be installed in November at Bronx Art Space.
 
Matthew Ostrowski—Summerland
Summerland is an installation for 24 computer-controlled telegraph sounders, exploring the intersection of technology and spiritualism at the dawn of the electrical age. The sounders are driven by texts from Samuel Morse, the telegraph’s inventor, and medium Kate Fox, who communicated with the dead through a ‘spiritual telegraph.’ These voices from beyond materialize in an electromagnetic séance of clicks and taps, sending messages we cannot quite grasp. Summerland examines the faulty nature of any medium, inevitably entangled with magical thinking, blind faith, and the ever-present possibility of humbug. MAAF funding will support Ostrowski’s touring exhibition of this new work.
 
Lindsay Packer—Motion at a Distance
Motion at a Distance is a stop-motion animation on 16mm film by Lindsay Packer with optical sound by Andrew Yong Hoon Lee. Packer animates a colorful series of luminous, temporary geometries while Lee’s soundtrack builds abstract textures to evoke mood and memory. With support from MAAF and MONO NO AWARE NPO, the artists will share the film with curators of moving image and screening programs in New York State and beyond, approach galleries and exhibition spaces where the work can be exhibited on loop over a longer duration, and apply to select festivals that exhibit on 16mm.
 
Laura Parnes—Tour Without End
Tour Without End (2014-present), is a multi-platform project that casts real-life musicians, artists and actors as bands on tour, and expands into a cross-generational, Trump–era commentary on contemporary culture and politics. The project was shot between 2014-2018 and includes an extensive archive of live performance and four Terabytes of raw footage. The installation version highlights this archive. Tour Without End is exhibited as a film, installation and as a performance event. MAAF funding will support the promotion of future presentations including a multi-channel installation version of the project as which it was initially conceived.

The Media Arts Assistance Fund (MAAF) supports electronic media and film organizations, as well as individual artists, in all regions of New York State.

For individual artists, MAAF provides support for the completion, distribution and exhibition of new works in all genres of sound and moving image art, including emergent technology. Grant awards assist artists in completing new work, reaching public audiences, and advance artistic exploration and public engagement in the media arts.

NYSCA Electronic Media & Film Program Director, Karen Helmerson, said “The NYSCA Regrant program managed by Wave Farm benefits us all in many important ways. This investment of public funds in New York State creates opportunity for public engagement in the media arts, and the development of creative culture through new technology and emerging fields.”

Wave Farm Executive Director Galen Joseph-Hunter said, “Wave Farm is delighted to be able to support these sixteen outstanding projects that represent the diversity of the media arts landscape in New York State. We are also very happy to have expanded the available opportunities this year. Now artists have two opportunities for support: Completion support for works nearly finished, and Distribution/Exhibition support for works completed in the prior year that are now ready for public audiences.”