Thu 19 Jul 2012, Komedia, Bath

At this sold-out show in Bath, The Creole Choir of Cuba performed as part of a growing partnership between University of Bath and the internationally renowned Real World Records.

The Choir are known for joyous, uplifting and intense performances of melodic songs with richly textured harmonies, all tightly woven around Caribbean rhythms.

The music celebrates the choir’s heritage as descendants of enslaved West Africans in the Caribbean and the group has nurtured music passed down through families since the early 19th century, gradually introducing modern Haitian influences. The group has been tipped by The Guardian as having potential to become “one of the world’s most successful vocal groups.”

‘For us music is like food, it feeds the spirit and is a major inspiration for everyday life.’

ICIA is proud to have presented The Creole Choir of Cuba as part of its 2012 theme of Internationalism.

www.realworldrecords.com

‘A mesmerising experience… absolutely extraordinary.’
Mark Lamarr, BBC Radio 2

‘Celebratory, with brisk Haitian rhythms and endlessly inventive vocal combinations.’
The New York Times

Watch a short documentary about the Creole Choir from Sky Arts

Or, how about a short clip documenting the actual show with ICIA at Komedia in Bath?

Luke Turrell (viola) accompanied by Lynn Carter (piano)
Thu 19 Apr, 2012, The Coach House, American Museum in Britain

Luke Turrell is a rising figure in the European classical music world. He began studying the viola at the age of 5, was winning awards from the age of 9, and received a scholarship to study at the Yehudi Menuhin School in 2000.

At the time of this performance, Luke was studying in Berlin under Hartmut Rohde, and had performed as a soloist with orchestras including the London Mozart Players, Guildford Symphony Orchestra, Kent Sinfonia, and the orchestra of the Academia di Cervo, Italy. He is a founding member of The Arnon String Quartett that has performed in Brazil, Japan and Germany, and recently received the top prize at the Max Reger International Chamber Music Competition.

For this special rush-hour concert at the American Museum, Luke performed works by Hummel, Hindemith, de Sarasate and Brahms.

Luke was accompanied by Lynn Carter, who herself performs regularly with her duo partner, cellist Jessie-Ann Richardson, as part of the Decibell Duo and the Liberata Trio.

Koyaanisqatsi (Life out of Balance) was released in 1983 and is the first of the ‘Qatsi Trilogy’ of films by Director Godfrey Reggio with an original score by Philip Glass. These films have become cult classics and were celebrated in 2011 at the Edinburgh International Festival.

Ko-yaa-nis-qa-tsi (from the Hopi language), n. 1. Crazy life. 2. Life in turmoil. 3. Life disintegrating. 4. Life out of balance. 5. A state of life that calls for another way of living.

A true collaboration between the composer and filmmaker, Koyaanisqatsi offers up a powerful vision of contemporary life in industrialised countries, set against the hypnotic syncopated rhythms that are trademark Philip Glass. In the final stages of postproduction, Reggio decided to cut the film to the score. In part, this aspect of the film became an underlying rationale for this first showing of a film under the music and sound art banner with ICIA, University of Bath.

This screening was presented in collaboration with the University’s Department of Computer Science.

“Reggio’s images haunt the viewer, accompanied by one of the most startling and original soundtracks ever written” The New York Times

Bobby Baker’s diary drawings chart her experiences of day hospitals, acute psychiatric wards, ‘crisis’ teams and various treatments. They convey the ups and downs of her recovery from mental illness, family life, work as an artist, breast cancer and just how funny all this harrowing stuff can be.

Bobby’s illustrated talk explores how painting, breathing and madness led to her remarkable drawings forming a critically acclaimed exhibition at the Wellcome Collection, London, touring internationally and eventually becoming a book.

Bobby was first encouraged to exhibit 30 of the drawings at ICIA by Dr Daniel Hinchcliffe (then Head of Visual Arts) as part of the University’s Mental Health Week in 2006.

Since 2009, Jo has been working with elite gymnasts in training and competition at Heathrow Gymnastics Club and the World Gymnastics Championships. As a former gymnast herself, she questions the ideas of human perfectibility through the ‘hot housing’ of young gymnasts, exploring how the most successful often become representatives of ideologies and nations.

Jo has exhibited internationally and is currently developing a new body of work, Other Spaces, which opens at Mostyn, Llandudno in June 2012, and will tour in 2012/13. She will also be one of the artists to exhibit in the inaugural exhibition at the National Media Museum’s new Media Space in London in March 2013.

Suspension

Mon 13 Feb – Fri 4 May

Art Space 2

The exhibition featured work developed over fours years leading up to the Olympic year (2012) including A-Z and Suspension (1), a large-scale wallpaper work specially printed for ICIA.

Incorporating hundreds of editorial sports photographs appropriated from various archives and mounted on individual blocks along the gallery wall, A-Z explored the human body in action. The clusters of pikes, straddles, layouts and twists depicted elements of a gymnastics routine named after the gymnasts who invented them, drawing attention to specific individuals, histories, nationalities and photographic media, and the visual language on which the discipline is built.

Jo’s interest in social systems, power and control is readily apparent in A-Z. The name and formal installation of the work hints at an order or system, but one that fails to fully materialise in the artwork. The presentation of immaculate photographs of famous gymnasts performing key moves is undermined by a fractured repetition of similar photographs, which place the gymnasts (and photographers) within a particular cultural and political context.

Artist’s Talk

Wed 7 Mar, 7pm

Art Space 2

Hosted by Dr Lynn Turner (Lecturer in Visual Cultures at Goldsmiths, University of London), this is your opportunity to hear from Jo Longhurst about Suspension and how it fits within our Internationalism theme. Jo will also be talking about her previous work including The Refusal. The talk starts at 7pm, but join us from 6pm for a drink and a chance to view the new exhibition.

Sat 3 Dec 2011, The Coach House, American Museum in Britain, Claverton Manor, Bath

A sold out solo piano concert by leading American free-jazz pioneer Matthew Shipp; one of the most respected and influential musicians of his generation. First achieving notoriety in the 1980s, Shipp has become known as a prolific performer, recording artist, curator and musical iconoclast. Beginning in the classical tradition, Shipp quickly migrated to jazz. He played in ensembles of leading figures such as David S. Ware and Roscoe Mitchell (Note Factory). Later, he established himself as a key figure in the avant-garde. All of these streams of musical practice and influence manifest themselves in Shipp’s virtuoso improvised performances.

“One of the most daring and original pianists in jazz.”
Rolling Stone

“A breaker of limitations in jazz via his dogged reinvention of the tradition…”
Wire

“Helping to make jazz vibrant and cool again…”
Newsweek Magazine

Matthew Shipp in conversation with Philip Clark

Taking ICIA’S 2011 theme as a starting point, Matthew Shipp discussed his approach as a musician and pianist with Philip Clark.

Clark is a music journalist and author, as well as being composer and improviser in his own right, working with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Orphy Robinson, Kate Westbrook, Ian Pace and Eddie Prevost.

Watch this space for forthcoming Podcast

Practice is a platform giving artists and audiences the opportunity to test and see new and innovative contemporary performance and dance in development.

Practice consists of four selected extracts of work in progress. An informal discussion follows, which forms an integral part of the evening; its purpose to create a safe environment for an engaging exchange of views between artists and a real audience.

It’s a place for experiments, a place for practice and a place for shaping new ideas.

Practice is a partnership project between ICIA and Salisbury Arts Centre from an original idea by TheatreWorks, now CEW (Creative Ecology Wiltshire).

The Rules of the Game

La Regle du Jeu 

Introduced by Steve Wharton from the Department of Politics, Languages & International Studies, Renoir’s brilliant social comedy is today hailed as a masterpiece and widely recognised as one of the greatest films ever made. At its premiere, audiences howled, whistled, tore up seats and burned newspapers in protest. Vilified by the critics and re-cut at the insistence of its producers, the film was finally banned by the French government as ‘demoralising’ and unpatriotic.

On the surface, a series of interlinked romantic intrigues taking place at a weekend shooting party in a country chateau, the film is in fact a study in the corruption and decay of French society on the eve of disaster; the outbreak of World War II.     

Jean Renoir – France 1939 – 110 mins – Black & White – Subtitles – PG