The intermedia ensemble of Thingamajigs Performance Group welcomes the new year with the expanded cinema apparatus of Keith Evans, percussion, Jurassic electronics, and projection by Suki O’Kane, glass, shō, hijiriki, and electric guitar by Edward Schocker, and voice and objects from Rae Diamond.
An early show with proceeds benefiting ATA. Pay at the door or show your donation receipt to gain entry. No one turned away for lack of funds.
About the Artists
Rae Diamond is an interdisciplinary artist and educator living on Cayuse, Umatilla, and Walla Walla land (Olympia, WA). They weave language, voice, breath, sounds, movement, and things found outside into experiences designed to stimulate attunement with nature. Rae founded and directed the Long Tone Choir 2013–2020, regularly collaborates with Thingamajigs Performance Group, and is a Redline Redefined commissioned artist. They are the author of The Cantigee Oracle (North Atlantic Books), and the author/illustrator of floating bones (First Matter Press). Rae teaches nature-inspired writing workshops and weekly Qigong classes, and spends as much time as possible in nature.
Keith Evans is an artist and activist who has been working and performing in the Bay Area for 25 years. Collaboration and co-creation has been a core element of his artistic practice having co-founded the experimental cinematic trio silt in 1989 as well as participating in many duos, groups and ensembles including Chresmologues and currently, Thingamajigs Performance group. He creates artwork in a cross-media array, using language, graphics, book arts, installation, kinetic sculpture, dance, film, video and sound, primarily for performance or with an expanded idea of performativity. The histories of imaginative media devices for altering consciousness find their way into his performances.
Suki O’Kane is an Oakland-based musician, composer, improviser and instigator working with artists from a wide array of music, movement, expanded cinema and public art genres. She is a student of monumental and durational forms, combining Jurassic electronics, everyday objects and found sounds to create noisy, hand held miniatures.
Edward Schocker is a composer and performer who creates music with made and found materials and alternate tuning systems. He studied at Mills College, where he worked with Pauline Oliveros, Alvin Curran, and independently with Lou Harrison. During his time at Mills College, he co-founded Thingamajigs, a Bay Area arts and education organization devoted to alternate methods of creating sound and art.
Edward was artist in residence at the European Dance Development Center in Düsseldorf, Germany, where he took part in and conducted workshops on instrument building and composer-choreographer collaborations. Schocker also composed music for a UNESCO-sponsored work with Echo Arts, a large bi-communal project in Cyprus aimed at building understanding between communities in conflict.
Edward’s works have been performed at the Berkeley Art Museum, Stanford Lively Arts, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Sacred and Profane Chamber Choir, Firebird Youth Chinese Orchestra, and International House in Tokyo. As a performer, he has presented work at festivals around the world, including Internationales Klangkunstfest in Berlin, Soundwave ((6)), San Francisco International Arts Festival and Culture Station Seoul 284 in South Korea.
