New York Ghost is Naoki Iwakawa’s current series of some 200 faces. Mixed media on paper. The events at Theaterlab will be an installation of the New York Ghost series. On May 21 and June 14, Naoki will perform action painting events 7 and 9 of the Excavation series integrating the New York Ghost series and technique onto the Excavation canvas. The New York Ghost series will also be for sale at the receptions before and after the action painting performance events.
Excavation is Naoki Iwakawa's action painting performance project. A single large canvas is painted in a series of 13 sessions creating layers of hidden paintings. Carlo Altomare accompanies each session, sometimes with other musicians. The object is to create a kind of archeological art object which contains in a single canvas the buried evidence of the series of painting performance events. These sessions began privately and are occasionally open to public performances. Each session is done with musicians and sometimes a human figure who lays on the canvas. When the series is finished the canvas will be presented in an installation with documentation (slides, video projections, audio, various objects) which offer evidence of the process at different stages. The 13th session and final presentation of the work will take place sometime in the Fall of 2009.
Naoki Iwakawa's action painting events are always very physically dynamic throwing himself at moments on the canvas or splashing paints from shallow bowls, or else blowing pigments from the palm of his hand. These performances are always done in collaboration with musicians who provide various dynamic musical fields and accents working closely with Naoki in the moment. The result is both meditative, immdediate and surprising, a kind of crisis Zen. Naoki is one of the founding members of The Cave in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. He has shown his work in many galleries in New York including The Cave, Cynthia Broan Gallery, Cast Iron, Gristmill, BPM, English Kills, and OK Harris.
Carlo Altomare (open piano) was a member of The Living Theatre from 1973-1980, acting in the plays of The Legacy of Cain cycle and composing music for The Dismantling of The Money Tower and Prometheus. He is the founder of The Alchemical Theatre in New York (1981-). The Alchemical Theatre presented the world premiere of There Is No More Firmament by Antonin Artaud in 1983 and devised an original piece, Pure War/The Madness of the Day based on the writing of Paul Verilio and Maurice Blanchot. He returned to the LT in the late 80’s to compose and perform the music for The Tablets and I and I. He is currently artistic director of The Theaterlab performance space at 137 W 14th St. where he teaches Meyerhold’s Biomechanics and Jazz Acting, a new form of non-fictional acting. He is co-director, with Orietta Crispino, of the Actors Research Group, which performed the first Jazz Acting piece: Appearance – A Suspense in Being in 2006 at Theaterlab. Carlo has performed often with Naoki primarily on open piano (a technique in which he employs both the keyboard and mallets and picks directly on the strings.) In these performances he will also introduce reel to reel tape creations manipulated in real time.
Yusuke Yamamoto (percussion) Born in Hyogo, Japan, Yusuke Yamamoto began studying the organ at age 5, percussion at age 11 and joined a local symphony orchestra soon after. He majored in percussion at Kunitachi College of Music in Tokyo, and began his career as a classical percussionist while attending college. When his interests later turned to improvisation and jazz, he was awarded a full scholarship for further studies at Berklee College of Music in Boston. While in Boston, Yusuke studied the vibraphone with Gary Burton, Ed Saindon and performed in numerous concerts, in addition to composing, recording and publishing various works. In 1995, he moved to New York City, where he formed the Golden Monkeys and released its first self-titled album in 1998. Yusuke has played with a wide variety of musicians and at countless venues throughout the city. He has toured to Japan, Europe and around the U.S. with groups, including the Golden Monkeys, Channel U, Chimp Beams, Dub Nomads, Chin Chin, Chiara Civello, Sound of Village, Echo (Joy Askew) and The Beat Kids. Living in NY, Yusuke is a multi-instrumental musician who performs on vibraphone, drums, percussion, flute, keyboards and bass. His unique sound is a blend of Asian, Brazilian and African music, as well as jazz, electronica, dub, rock and contemporary classical. He is currently active with his solo project, Channel U, and collaborates with several groups, including Chin Chin and Dizzy Ventilators.
Stephanie Griffin: (viola) Acclaimed by the New York Times for her “fiery, full-throttle performance” and “virtuoso flair,” Stephanie Griffin has performed internationally as a soloist and a chamber musician. Her greatest commitment is to the music of Indonesian composer Tony Prabowo, with whom she has collaborated since 1997. As a soloist, she has worked closely with a wide variety of composers, among them Kee Yong Chong; Matthew Greenbaum; Arthur Kampela; Ursula Mamlok and Tristan Murail. She is a regular guest with Continuum, and member of Argento, Transfiguration, String Orchestra of New York City (SONYC), the Riverside Symphony and the Princeton Symphony, where she serves as principal violist. An active improviser, she has worked with traditional Indonesian musicians and free jazz legend Butch Morris and performs regularly with Carl Maguire’s avant-jazz band Floriculture. Ms. Griffin has recorded for Aeon, Koch, Arte Nova, Centaur, Harmolodic, Siam Records and Aksara, an independent Indonesian label. She studied viola with William Gordon, Paul DeClerck, Wayne Brooks and Samuel Rhodes and holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from The Juilliard School.
Julie Josephson (trombone) is one of the few brass musicians to receive the prestigious Artist Diploma at the New England Conservatory of Music. She has won several concerto solo competitions and given solo appearances throughout the United States. A freelance artist in the New York area, Julie has performs on Broadway, at Lincoln Center, and in Carnegie Hall. She is a regular guest artist at Boston University, Eastman School of music, and various others on Long Island and in New Jersey.
Arrington de Dionyso (bass clarinet and throat singing) In 1995 he founded the avant-rock group Old Time Relijun, which has since toured and recorded throughout the US, Europe, and Israel, and has released eight albums on the K Records label from Olympia, enthralling audiences with an approach to performance described as deep hermetic practice and/or "some fuckin' scary shit" by critics in the know. As a solo artist, Arrington performs on the bass clarinet, jaw harps, and his voice with a distinctly multiphonic ability inspired by Tuvan throatsinging and the ecclesiastics of Albert Ayler and Don Van Vliet. Pushing the envelope between musicality and pure energy, between shamanic ecstacy and lunacy, he enwraps rooms with resonant sound. His devotion to bringing traditional Tuvan musics into an experimental music context has been acknowledged by Tran Quan Hai, the famous ethnomusicologist and the world's leading expert on throatsinging.
“Moist” Paula Henderson (bari sax) “I got the name "Moist" Paula when I formed the band Moisturizer with Moist Gina Rodriguez in 1998. Up until then I had been having fun playing sax with a lot of great bands and musicians in Australia and New York, many of whom I still play with. Since the day my friend Paul Cumming knocked on my door with a tenor sax in his hand saying "this is yours for a month and if you like it you have to come up with $400", I've had many exciting saxophonic adventures, particularly since as a result of what turned out to be an opportune theft I switched to bari, which I've wielded live and/or in the studio with many of my musical heroes including James Chance & The Contortions, Gogol Bordello, TV on the Radio, The Roots, Martin Luther & Cody Chesnutt, Ed Kuepper and many more. Moisturizer is still my main musical squeeze and in New York I continue to play every week with Reverend Vince Anderson & The Love Choir (in our 12th year!); and Burnt Sugar: The Arkestra Chamber, Greg Tate's conducted improvised orchestral organism. At the end of 2006 I quit my part-time secretary job and started a solo saxtronic project, Secretary. I recorded and released my first solo album, Secret Life of Secretary and performed the material in a variety of spaces including a storefront gallery, a theatre, a coffee shop, a cinema, rock clubs and All Tomorrows Parties festival. Then I got lonely and turned it into a collaborative duo called SECRETARY feat. BigBoss. As part of The Hedonistic Horns, I have recorded and performed with Derrin Maxwell, The Dry Yai crew of Sierra Leone, The Bogmen, GanoRyan, Deepa Soul, Wakey Wakey, Looker, Shelley Nicole and many others. And I always want more!
