Chaos and Classicism
Performance, Digital Workshop, and Film Screening
October 9 and 10, 2010
1071 Fifth Avenue (at 89th Street)
New York City
Premiere Performance
Coup de Foudre, Based on The Blood of a Poet by Jean Cocteau
Paul Miller a.k.a. DJ Spooky, Ballet Noir, and Melvin van Peebles
Saturday, October 9 @ 8 pm
Sunday, October 10 @ 6 pm
In a theatrical reinterpretation of Cocteau’s filmic masterpiece, three generations of groundbreaking African American artists connect through a je ne sais quoi of French culture. Paul Miller a.k.a. DJ Spooky that Subliminal Kid performs his own original music score, mixing live instruments and studio recordings with the Telos Ensemble, while Corey Baker, artistic codirector of Ballet Noir and current Fela! star, converts the extreme physicality of the lead film character into choreographic moments. Emmy award-winning Melvin Van Peebles, “the godfather of independent film and modern black cinema,” simultaneously reads Cocteau poems. Coup de Foudre explores the ambiguous relationship between modern compositional strategies, based on sampling and digital media, and the experience of tying cinematic history to contemporary times. A post-performance discussion with the artists follows moderated by Christoph Cox, professor of philosophy, Hampshire College. For tickets visit guggenheim.org/publicprograms.
Digital Workshop with DJ Spooky
The Secret Song II
Sunday, October 10, 2:30 – 4:30 pm
In conjunction with Coup de Foudre, the Sackler Center for Arts Education is pleased to present The Secret Song II, a digital music workshop. Led by DJ Spooky himself, the workshop provides participants a unique opportunity to use their iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad to invent their own compositional mixes using sampling and custom sound effects, followed by a museum visit and the performance of Coup de Foudre. The Secret Song II will explore the connections between digital mixing and multimedia forms, mining the possibilities of mobile media to create art anytime, anywhere. For adults 18+; ages 14–17 can attend accompanied by an adult. No previous music or art-making experience necessary. Limited enrollment. To register and for more information guggenheim.org/publicprograms.
Film Screening
The Blood of a Poet (Le sang d’un poète), 1930
Jean Cocteau
Saturday, October 9 @ 6:30 pm
Sunday, October 10 @ 4:30 pm
The first installment in the Orphic Trilogy—a series of three films by acclaimed French avant-garde director Jean Cocteau—the groundbreaking film The Blood of a Poet is one of cinema’s great experiments. A portrait of the plight of the artist, the film utilizes surrealist imagery to explore the poet’s obsessions with the relationships between art and dreams, metaphor and reality, and life and death. French with English subtitles. Free with museum admission.
*Image above:
Courtesy Comité Jean Cocteau.
© 2010 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris.
