FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Pulldate November 21, 2008

Contact: Levi Fuller
Jack Straw New Media Gallery
(206) 634-0919; levi@jackstraw.org

KIDNAPPED WATER FOUND AT JACK STRAW NEW MEDIA GALLERY
Collaborative Sound/Light Installation Extended Through November 21, 2008

(Seattle, WA) Kidnapping Water: Bottled Operas Sound/Light Installation, a collaboration between Seattle-based composer Byron Au Yong and artist Randy Moss, has been extended through November 21, 2008.

"We wanted more people to have a chance to experience this thrilling new multimedia work," says Jack Straw Executive Director Joan Rabinowitz.
 
Both Au Yong and Moss are known for their thoughtful explorations of dislocation in music and art. Their installation is a study on the movement of water using four-channel acoustic recordings and 104 animated LED lights. The music (from Bottled Operas by Au Yong) and the object (spotlights on a circle of salt by Moss) float in the dark contemplative gallery.

"I'm glad the show's been extended," says sound artist Susie Kozawa. "This installation invites people to sit, walk and travel around while listening."

The title - Kidnapping Water: Bottled Operas - hints at a playful and urgent call to action about water resources. The Installation emotionally addresses these aspects in a new way. By having the presence and absence of water through sound and light, Au Yong and Moss evoke the essence of hope and loss. In addition, a video collage by multimedia artist Jean-Stephane contains footage of water and the Bottled Operas.


In August 2008, four pairs of singers and percussionists performed Au Yong’s Kidnapping Water: Bottled Operas in waterways throughout the Pacific Northwest. Locations included Beaver Lake Park, Des Moines Marina, Downtown Seattle, Echo Lake, Kubota Gardens, Salmon Creek Ravine, Seahurst Park, and White River.

By taking opera out of the opera house, Kidnapping Water connected the power and beauty of traditional operatic voices with a musical experience intimately connected to nature. The site-responsive performances took music directly to places where people interact with many forms of water, creating opportunities for audience members and ducks from all walks of life to experience the Bottled Operas.

Percussionists played water with wood, stone, bamboo, bone, rope, hide, plants, and metal. Eight writers from diverse cultural and artistic traditions not often represented in opera wrote the 64 libretti; the Bottled Operas, prompted by the I-Ching (Book of Changes) were anything but a traditional operatic experience. The installation continues the innovative concept by being a new gathering place to listen.


Byron Au Yong creates ceremonial musical events scored for voices with Asian, European and hand-made instruments. His works have been featured in concert and site-specific locations as diverse as the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg and Tokyo Art Museum. Author Russell Leong writes that Au Yong's work "portends the promise of this new millennium."

Randy Moss explores the fleeting nature of human presence using computer sensor and display networks. As an interaction designer and software developer, Moss has created products for Electronic Arts, Sega, Ofoto, and Motorola. His installation dislocator was selected as a Visual Arts Pick by the Seattle Weekly.

Jack Straw Productions is a non-profit audio arts organization. The New Media Gallery Residency Program offers established and emerging artists the opportunity to create and present experimental work that utilizes sound.

More information about the artists is available online at hearbyron.com and rmoss.com. Information about the Jack Straw New Media Gallery is available online at jackstraw.org or by calling (206) 634-0919.

Kidnapping Water: Bottled Operas Sound/Light Installation
by Byron Au Yong and Randy Moss
Video collage by Jean-Stephane

September 12 - November 21, 2008 (New Date)
Monday - Friday, 9am - 5pm, Free Admission

Jack Straw New Media Gallery
4261 Roosevelt Way NE
Seattle WA  98105  USA
Phone 1 (206) 634-0919
Email jsp@jackstraw.org

Kidnapping Water: Bottled Operas was created with support from Creative Capital's Multi-Arts Production (MAP) Fund, supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation; 4Culture's King County Site-Specific Performance Network; Bumbershoot Festival of the Arts; and Jack Straw Productions.