The curators brand the Filament Festival a biennial, which not only showcases the culmination of the past two years of EMPAC's "creations" via commissions and residencies, but also offers a "personal space" for audiences to encounter their artistic process.
What they don't mention, but I feel is equally, if not more critical, is that the curation of these 15 premieres, exchanges with interdisciplinary practitioners and the archived documentation of the past two years also articulates their "founding discourse" and vision for the future of the "center."
Taken together, these collected works (carefully contextualized by the talks and the documentation) define and author institutionally what "experimentation" means in relation to media & performance in the 21st c., and attempt to establish the "center" as a legitimate site for both rigorous research and process-driven inquiry.
As articulated by Johannes Goebel in the Director's foreward in the program, events at EMPAC "evoke reactions ranging from enthusiastic appreciation to raised eyebrows--exactly the mix necessary to ensure that experimental media and performance arts are living up to their challenge."
The works I experienced this weekend did consciously provoke and proactively engaged their audiences, challenge their respective mediums conventions/technologies, and incite deep emotional and intellectual inquiry. They induced what Jane McGonigal calls an "experience grenade."
In particular, Yanira Castro's Wilderness, was a brave and ambitious exploration into not only the delicate eco-systems we inhabit, but of the invisible symbiosis between our senses, one another and technology. The use of contact microphones dispersed beneath the mulch to trigger an open musical score dictated by both the dancers and audiences movements, which the pianist played real time, and which in turn the dancers responded to with improvised phrases mediated by their inter(re)actions with the audience, all quietly underscored the interplay of control and subjugation required to sustain (or potentially distort) even a temporary habitas.
And Lars Jan's Abacus was equally complex and compelling. I was mesmerized by the schizophrenic juxtapositions of empirical visual evidence and absolutist conjectures which Paul Abacus persuasively pro-offered. And yet, I left wondering who was Paul Abacus really, an enlightened subject instigating new modes of knowledge, a talk show charlatan post-TED, or a vacuous conduit of regurgitated information, a zombie, who has lost his subjectivity within the overwhelming data stream of contradictory evidence and prismatic points of view, drowning him? Certainly, he represents a dynamic "digital identity;" simultaneously inhabiting the multiplicity of the collective on screen, and the single, vulnerable Beckettsian man, alone on stage, articulating himself into existence.
Lastly, Micah Silver and Sergei Tcherepnin's interpretation of Maryann Amarcher's inscrutable unfinished composition, The Star Room, which attempts to sonically represent zero gravity through precise speaker constellations, sculpted sound configurations and 30 datasets transported me into a sublime visceral hiatus from reality. I felt myself lifted into a stratisphere not to dissimilar from what the members of Apollo 12 experienced when they first encountered the splendor of the moon.
All of these works show a tremendous commitment on EMPACs part to interrogating critical contemporary ideas and an unabashed openness to experimentation, and the integrity of individual artistic process. And no doubt, the incredible technical resources and institutional support provided by the period of intense incubation at EMPAC, not to mention the exposure to diverse audiences will enable these productions to go on to wider visibility in major cities across the U.S. and globally.
Returning to EMPAC's stated mission and methods, however, I am nonetheless troubled by a few questions. Who's the intended/attending audience for this work? What is the "challenge" their commissioned work is living up to? Does "enthusiastic appreciation" and "raised eyebrows" justify such cost prohibitive experimentation?
Let's address the above one at a time.
Audience
Based on rudimentary observation, I would observe that the majority of audience members were the artists themselves, friends of participating artists, and local artists either within RPI or surrounding Capital region, and a handful of students. On a whole, for an art festival, many years in the planning, the numbers were relatively low. Which makes me question, who was the intended audience, how were they marketed to, and what was the anticipated outcome of the festival?
If the "wider public" or student population was not indeed the intended audience, perhaps the goal was to cater to the media, cultural practitioners and funders. And yet, none were insight.
Challenge
My assumption would be that by selecting the word "challenge" Goebel intends the work coming out of EMPAC to engage in a confrontation with the "status quo;" the status quo of the commercial art market, the status quo of accepted social and political realities, the status quo of disciplinary boundaries and technological implementation. Through cross-pollinizing experimentation in ideas, process, collaborative configurations and technology, EMPAC could effectively re-orientate the "centers" of power and knowledge to the periphery where experimentation flourishes.
But I don't believe this is what the director had in mind.
Response
Evoking "reactions ranging from enthusiastic appreciation to raised eyebrows" suggests to me a non-critical, bourgeois response. One which invites navel gazing and little reflexivity. The intellectual, creative, technical and economic resources available at EMPAC offer an an unprecedented opportunity to re-signfiy culture, to anticipate social evolution in new and exciting ways. To galvanize change. We want audiences to be provoked, to awaken their hearts and minds in new and unanticipated ways. To stir their passions and imaginations!
But again, the articulated vision falls short.
So, the success of the EMPAC's programs goes without question. The quality and value of the research and creative undertakings are ambitious and inherently innovative. But what I am contesting is EMPAC's stated goals, which upon closer examination seem ambiguous and shrouded in mystery. I sense there is much more incredible potential in terms of impact and visibility to unearth.
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