A 21st-century arts phenomenon comes to Detroit.
Suzanne Chessler
-
Contributing Writer
D
etroit soon will have something
extraordinarily bright and very
today in common with New York
and Paris — an outdoor light and technol-
ogy art festival showcasing pieces created
internationally.
DLECTRICITY, free and running Oct.
5-6, will invite viewers out into the eve-
ning to see creative projects transforming
the Woodward Corridor in Midtown just
as similar shows change facades in the two
other cities.
While Detroit's event will be a debut proj-
ect for the area, it will be fashioned after
experiences with like events drawing indi-
viduals of all ages into other metropolitan
centers.
"Each of some 35 works of art will be
different and exciting," says Marsha Miro,
chairman of the curatorial committee and
a member of Temple Beth El. "There also
will be music and food trucks to add to the
enjoyment!'
Favorite cultural centers — the Detroit
Institute of Arts, the Charles H. Wright
Museum of African American History,
the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit
(MOCAD), Wayne State University — will
provide some of the settings for installa-
tions.
Children will be encouraged to join in
with plans for a bike parade with light deco-
rations, shadow puppet performances and
make-and-take activities.
"Works containing light are very acces-
sible, particularly for young people," says
Miro, MOCAD founding director. "There
will be a giant monkey projected on build-
ings from a moving car and an enormous
robotic flower opening and changing colors.
"Technology is so advanced that art using
light can have a canvas as large as a build-
ing, and the number of artists using techno-
logical media keeps growing as they chal-
lenge their thinking and shaping abilities."
DLECTRICITY was arranged under the
64:133:10:42:36
Years:
Days:
Hours:
Mins:
Secs:
The Legacy Lives On
Visions (rainbow rose)
StereoNegative
coordination of Art Detroit Now, a group
of arts organizations planning projects to
enhance the cultural quality of the city, and
Midtown Detroit Inc., a collaborative initia-
tive for economic and community develop-
ment.
"Visitors will see Detroit as they've never
seen it before says Marc Schwartz, chair-
man of DLECTRICITY and Art Detroit
Now and a member of the Maas Prize
Committee, which recognizes artists in the
Jewish community.
"We've had a fantastic team committed to
the area as we've put this all together, and
we've consulted with other big cities hav-
ing major light festivals. We expect 50,000
people to participate as we also kick off
Detroit Gallery Week, a 10-day celebration
of art showplaces."
A local indoor exhibit capturing art made
of light, Luminale Detroit, is being planned
for October-December by Kunsthalle
Detroit, 5001 Grand River. Information will
be posted on the gallery's website, www.
kunsthalle-detroit.org.
Contourl
Evan Roth, who grew up in Michigan and
now lives in Paris, is returning his talents
to the area with a DLECTRICITY exhibit
that recognizes a local icon and has a larger
message.
The Legacy Lives On, a memorial tribute
to hip-hop producer James Dewitt Yancey
(a native Detroiter also known as J Dilla
and Jay Dee), presents an urban-scale timer
counting down to 70 years after Yancey's
death, a timeframe in line with copyright
law.
Yancey's hip-hop music will not enter the
public domain until those years pass, and
Roth questions the acceptability of waiting
as punctuated through his project appear-
ing at the Wright Museum.
"Part of the planning of this installation
involves coming from Michigan and being
influenced by hip-hop at an early age says
Roth, 34.
"Like a lot of hip-hop, Jay Dee's music
was based in sampling, and he was a master
of that craft, digging through records, tak-
ing bits and pieces of music and turning it
all into something new
"People will see large-scale text projected
on the facade of a building, and I hope they
will be confronted with the fact that we
aren't going to be able to touch his work for
decades. I want them to question that time
period!"
Roth, who has collaborated with Jewish
software developer Michael Frumin, sug-
gests that the reason the copyright time-
frame now seems excessive has to do with
how people move more quickly through
the information age and create their own
projects with tools such as YouTube and
blogging.
"A lot of my interest in open source and
sharing, as well as copyright issues, came
from Frumin's lab:' he says.
Roth, who has work in the permanent
collection of the Museum of Modern Art in
New York City, compares artists' interests in
light to artists' interests in the Internet. He
considers both technologies empowering
because they are not as expensive as other
media.
"To be able to communicate on the scale
of city infrastructure and architecture is
something that wasn't impossible — you
see public graffiti and sculpture — but the
time and budget required to make those
kinds of art are not necessary with newer
technologies like projection," Roth says.
Two other pieces give a fuller sense of the
range of work on display.
Whale, a large-scale, three-channel video
production, has paintings by Netherlands
artist Jaaco Olivier; the paintings are
brought to life through animation that
immerses the viewer into an underwater
seascape at the Michigan Science Center.
Rise & Fall: Repeat, a sound and video
installation consisting of seemingly dis-
jointed fragments of absurdist entertain-
ment, demonstrates unity through rhythm
at MOCAD.
Miro, whose committee went through
some 200 submissions before deciding
on the final displays, calls attention to a
project at the Detroit Public Library, where
Knowledge Is Power, designed by New D
Media, introduces projection-mapped 3D
animation and live music to tell the human
story of knowledge.
"The history of literature will be cap-
tured through these projected images:' she
says. "The idea of history and learning is
important to the Jewish community, and
[attention to] the arts helps build a larger
community!' El
DLECTRICITY will be held 7 p.m.-
midnight Friday, Oct. 5, and 7 p.m.-2
a.m. Saturday, Oct. 6, based along
the Woodward Corridor. The free
event coincides with Detroit Gallery
Week (www.artdetroitnow.com ). For a
full list of DLECTRICITY displays and
activities, go to www.dlectricity.com .
September 20 • 2012
59