Christina deRoos

Remote Control Tomato @ Sidewalk Festival & Detroit Dance City Festival

I have two videos being screened plus a live performance this week, all related to Remote Control Tomato. An initiative of Spread Art, Remote Control Tomato is a collaborative performance platform of Thomas Bell (sound, performance art) and me (visuals, performance art) in which we site-specific, immersive environments. Mixing a variety of technologies, performances rely on improvisation and generally invite public participation.

Con(text): Identify
Remote Control Tomato (Christina deRoos/video, Thomas Bell/sound) with Rachael Ahn Harbert/live movement, Laura Arend/recorded movement)
Screening at The Virgil H. Carr Center, part of Detroit Dance City Festival, Thursday, July 30 @ 1:30pm and Friday, July 31 @ 3:30pm

 

Con(text) is a site-specific participatory performance work that explores the intersection of mainstream media, conformity, social justice, and identity. The work immerses audiences in a low and hi tech multimedia environment of video, sound, movement and performance art, creating a performative experience of authentic human interaction within which an exploration of individual privacy and autonomy can take place. This excerpt of the larger work explores themes of self-reflection, personal versus group identity and inside versus outside.

Untitled
Remote Control Tomato (Christina deRoos/video, Thomas Bell/sound) with Sarah Benoliel
Screening at Sidewalk Festival for the Performing Arts, Saturday, August 1 @ 6pm at Artist Village.

Remote Control Tomato (Christina deRoos/video, Thomas Bell/sound) with Rachael Ahn Harbert/movement and Marcus Elliot/sound
Live, site-specific, participatory performance at Sidewalk Festival, Saturday, August 1 @ 9pm.

Sidewalk is an outdoor celebration of performance and installation art in the heart of Detroit’s Old Redford and Brightmoor neighborhood. Sidewalk presents radical, interactive works of performance art, dance, music, theater and sculpture in unique spaces, curating original work that uncovers the hidden potential of these places. Activated spaces include alleys, storefronts, sidewalks, community gardens,parking lots, and streets.

 

 

Friday, February 13 // Dwelling Lightheartedly in the Futility of Everything // Matthew Daher EP Release Party @ MOCAD

I'm collaborating with Matthew Daher on the video environment for his upcoming EP release party. Aside from the fun of tangling with a lot of cables and projectors, I'm happy to support a project with a title that concisely sums up the advice of dozens of books I've read: Dwelling Lightheartedly in the Futility of Everything.

Friday, February 13 @ MOCAD
8:00 p.m.
$5 (Free for MOCAD members)

 

Dwelling Lightheartedly In The Futility of Everything is the latest release from Detroit drummer/composer/producer Matthew Daher. The culmination of 4 years of explorations in groove-driven songwriting, with studio production guided by electroacoustic gesture and manipulation, Dwelling weaves ambient, noise, and post-rock sensibilities into cerebral and emotive compositions inspired by artists such as Georgia Anne Muldrow, J Dilla, and Bjork.

The EP release party's multimedia performance will explore themes addressed in the compositions: infinite regress, meditation, chronic anxiety, and the volatility of romantic emotional entanglement. The event will feature Detroit video and movement artists Christina deRoos, Kevin Eckert, Costa Sirdenis, Goran Butorac, Maggie Piellusch, Alex Pavlov, Natasha Beste, Rachel Ann Harbert, Lisa LaMarre, Marianne Brass, Angela Sutcliffe, Shanice Rollins, and Rena Hertrich, with Dial81 DJ sets before and after the performance.

Video Art

I recently created two new video works for exhibitions in Detroit. The first, Extraction, was included in "Video Center," a September exhibition at the N'Namdi Gallery for Contemporary Art during the biennial Dlectricity festival.

On the second night of the exhibition, the gallery space was further activated with a collaborative, interdisciplinary performance, Extraction/Distraction, featuring a live mix of Extraction and other video, created in real time in response to sounds from Thomas Bell and movement from Ryan Myers-Johnson.

Photos: Meighen Jackson

The second recent video work is an untitled piece exploring the relationship of sound and movement, and will be shown Saturday, October 18 during Infrared Ultrasound, a one night video art and performance event curated by Natasha Beste and Matthew Daher.

Also in September, I collaborated with Sherry Aliberti's The Cocoon Project to project video onto morphing architectural structures during evening performances at Detroit Design Festival and the Unofficial Dlectricity After Party. Separately, I photographed Cocoons as they made their way throughout Detroit.

See more photos here.

If you are in Detroit this week, you can catch a live performance of real-time visual projections during the Creative [ ] Incubator, Thursday, October 16.

Social/Media @ Eastern Market / Sept. 7

Sunday, September 7th from 1pm - 7pm I'll be presenting Social/Media, an offline interactive installation as part of Eastern Market Sidewalk Jamboree. Hosted by Detroit's Sidewalk Festival of Performing Arts and the Sunday Street Market, Eastern Market Sheds 2, 3 AND 4 will host curated, site-specific performances highlighting independent artists and celebrating the unique architecture of Eastern Market.

   

Community Quilt @ Sidewalk Festival 2014

Founded by Ryan Myers-Johnson, Sidewalk Festival of the Performing Arts is an annual outdoor celebration of site-specific performance and installation art, in the heart of Detroit’s Old Redford/Brightmoor Neighborhoods.

For Sidewalk 2014, Spread Art facilitated a participatory visual art project, inviting residents of and visitors to Brightmoor and Old Redford to transform recycled fabric into a temporary installation reflecting collective impressions in response to "Brightmoor Is" or "Old Redford Is." The fabric pieces will next be quilted together to form a creative archive of one day in the history of Brightmoor and Old Redford. See more 2014 photos here.

For the inaugural edition of the festival (2013), Remote Control Tomato (a collaboration with Thomas Bell) presented U.S.A. PATRIOT ACT(ION), a multimedia exploration of the surveillance state. See 2013 photos here.

 

Summer!

Summer 2014 began with another crazy weekend of art during Bushwick Open Studios. This year Spread Art presented Transient ID: DET <-> NYC in collaboration with Indus Truck Works, Ltd.

The event built upon last year's Don't Box Me In, again including two full days of performance art. This year added a visual art show inside the box truck brought from Detroit by Indus Truck Works, and the street outside of Pine Box was closed all day Saturday, which brought many other performance artists and groups to the streets, including a full day of music curated by ThingNY.

I presented a work-in-progress version of All Systems are Inherently Unstable as part of the group show in the truck (left image below). The finished work will show at Whitdel Arts during the annual Members Show, running July 11 - August 9 (middle image below). 

        

Saturday evening, in collaboration with The Cocoon Project, I participated in Transient ID: Inside, the Future which took place at sunset. With multiple artists collaborating in an improvised multimedia setting, I contributed a real-time mix of projected visuals (right image above), including remixed documentation of Anya Liftig's performance art work, including Ancient Evenings, Feeder and Failing/Flying: The Mash.

Next up is an interactive installation on August 2 during the second annual Sidewalk Festival of Performing Arts, an outdoor celebration of site-specific performance and installation art in the heart of Detroit’s Old Redford/Brightmoor Neighborhoods.

Infinite Inspiration

"Infinite Inspiration"

Included in the fourth issue of ∞ mile (infinite mile). a monthly online Detroit-based art journal.

Sherrine Azab           JenClare Gawaran       Marsha Music         Ryan Myers-Johnson

Of all the places I’ve been fortunate to live, none ever captured my heart as quickly and as deeply as Detroit. The creative expression, as well as the ideas, perspectives and histories, of the people I meet consistently grabs my attention, and ultimately leads me to see, hear and feel my life in new ways.

What follows is a conversation that never took place. It is a collaged memory of actual conversations I had over the past few weeks, by phone, email and in person, with four artists who inspire me with their creative practice, their artistic output and their fundamental ways of being in the world.

The spectrum of connected and disconnected memories, creative motivations, and individual passions in this unreal conversation reflects the aspect of Detroit I most deeply admire – the people who call this city home. 

If you aren’t already familiar with the work of Sherrine Azab, JenClare Gawaran, Marsha Music and Ryan Myers-Johnson (or even if you are), I encourage you to visit their websites, and take every opportunity to experience their work in person.

"what will remain" on view until 4/19 @ Whitdel Arts

"what will remain"
mixed media

In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes. Benjamin Franklin

Life doesn’t last; art doesn’t last. It doesn’t matter. Eva Hesse

When you realize how perfect everything is you will tilt your head back and laugh at the sky. Siddhartha

   

   

See more photos here.

Whitdel Gallery

March 7 - April 19, 2014
Gallery hours: Saturdays, 12-3pm and March 20 & April 17, 7-9pm

We usually take steps to ensure artwork stands the test of time, but sometimes truly remarkable things only exist for a short while. Featuring artwork by local and national artists, "The Temporary Show" calls attention to the ephemeral, fleeting and transitory. This exhibition may look different from one week to the next, as work grows, decays, evaporates, melts, or is somehow manipulated by the viewer.

 

 

enough/\not/\enough

enough/\not/\enough was performed February 20th as part of the Creative [performance art] Incubator.

      

never enough but enough but not all i have but all i give and yet it really isn’t enough and yet it really is all i do while my heroes did/do/will do more this is all i do and i know it is really both not enough and enough and the most selfish thing is the most selfless thing and yet i’m sure it really is never enough unless i’m wrong and later i find out it was/is/will be just right

      

      

Click here for more photos.

 

Creative [Performance Art] Incubator - 2/20/14

I'm looking forward to presenting work as part of Spread Art's Creative [performance art] Incubator @ detroit contemporary (5141 Rosa Parks, Detroit). The evening includes an incredible group of artists:
Upended Teacups / Chloe Bass / Jorge Rojas / Reed Esslinger / Thomas Bell / Drew Walker.

Thursday, February 20, 2014
Doors: 8pm
Performances: 8:30pm to 11pm
$5 suggested donation

A project of Spread Art, the third Thursday of every month The Creative [ ] Incubator invites creatives to experiment with the low and the hi tech while exploring new possibilities in an improvised, collaborative performance environment. Each month features a different [focus] discipline, with [music] happening every other month.

The Creative [ ] Incubator began as The Creative Music Incubator, hosted for 1 year at The Tank in NYC. Now based in Detroit, the series maintains its focus on experimentation and collaboration, while exploring different creative discipline each month