Fom Boychild to Tim Hecker – Get revved for MOCA's high voltage performance series launching tomorrow night
Step and Repeat is MOCA LA’s series of high voltage performance nights bringing the museum back in tune with its experimental roots. For the next four Saturdays they gather hybrid artists that refuse to be boxed into categories, independent voices that no one can define. Poets and performance artists share space with DJs and comics in this high-energy chaotic experiment. It‘s all about collaborations and crossovers expressing the fluidity of what performance can be.
The idea was born out of MOCAtv. A channel that grew from a producer of exhibition videos into a platform for daring performance works. Inspired by the increasingly vibrant local performance scene, MOCA have made a fearless selection of vital artists pushing the limits of what they do. These Saturday nights have all the ingredients for something magical and transformative. They are nights that showcase the brave and experimental, featuring acts that crunch categories and confound expectations.
SEPTEMBER 13
Jacoby Satterwhite transforms and synthesises – smashing the limits between virtual and live action art. His 3D animated intergalactic universes feature his own cyber-sexual self right at the centre. Inspired by modern dance and voguing, his hyper-charged performances have developed their own language. Dazzling, seductive, totally unmissable.
Ashland Mines, (aka Total Freedom) is L.A. legend, member of the Fade to Mind crew, and at the heart of some of the best underground art and music to come out of the city. An artist, DJ and renowned party-maker, collaboration is everything to him and he’s teamed with a spectrum of acts from Wu Tsang to Ryan Trecartin. Step and Repeat sees his first time collaboration with Jacolby Satterwhite – and we’re excited.
Vanessa Place is the super cynical dark overlord of the poetry world. A criminal defence lawyer, she uses her own legal documents as poetry. It’s challenging, complex, sexist, racist, and generally just odious – all in the name of conceptual poetry. She says she’s “giving people what they don’t know they don’t want.” Prepare to be insulted.
SEPTEMBER 20
The New York based performer and poet describes herself as “just another feminist confessional writer trying to find a good way to deal with her literary dads.” But in reality her work is something extraordinary. Her latest book The Compleat Purge is filled with suicide notes, sexting and love letters. It’s a crisis of narcissism, raw emotions and compulsive teen girl behavior.
Wu Tsang created weekly dance party Wildness with Dj’s Total Freedom and Nguzunguzu. His groundbreaking film of the same name won awards for its exploration of transgender identity in underground LA nightlife. For Step and Repeat he’s collaborating with performance artist boychild and cellist Patrick Belaga for ongoing performance ‘Moved by the Motion’ in which spoken word poetry provides cues for a visceral high impact performance.
SEPTEMBER 27
Yung Jake’s rap videos smash together the worlds of hip-hop, technology, and contemporary art. He was ‘born on the internet in 2011’ and lives as a mysterious digital persona. His latest track ‘Unfollow’ debuted on MOCAtv before it appeared on iTunes. His lyrics flash back and forth from the virtual to the physical as he unfollows and detags his ex. A rare chance to catch Yung Jake IRL.
Los Angeles based Nguzunguzu’s global-disco blend mixes Afro-Portugese hits from clubs in Lisbon with R&B divas and Dutch house cuts. Duo Asma Maroof and Daniel Pineda took their name from the Solomon island figurehead used to ward off dangerous sea spirits in tribal wars. Their evocative EP’s and mixtapes seamlessly stitch distinct exotic sounds.
OCTOBER 4
Artist, performer and underground style icon Kate Durbin’s most recent book E! Entertainment is a dizzyingly up close, atomically precise, minute by minute record of America’s fascination with reality TV. She’s the founding editor of online Lady Gaga journal Gaga Stigmata and Tumblr project Women as Objects. Kate Durbin offers up life as performance.
The visual art world loves Brendan Fowler for his deconstructed photography installations. But he first become known for fictitious pop act BARR that toured internationally with Tracy + the Plastics, Xiu Xiu and Animal Collective. His act, now radically updated as And Martin, disrupts and breaks down TED talks and stand up.
Canadian musician Tim Hecker is a bit of a sound legend. He’s been creating eerie musical soundscapes for years. But since the release of ‘Virgins’ in 2013 Hecker’s been more focused on performance, recording with a small group of orchestral musicians. His music will haunt your dreams.
Step and Repeat kicks off tomorrow night at The Geffen Contemporary, get tickets here.