marc ribot and kjell bjorgeengen December 6, 2007

Norwegian visual artist Kjell Bjorgeengen uses simple and fundamental flicker video to explore the interaction of noise, architecture, and decay. Shades of darkness, given from the outside as a simple pairing of the binary experience, counteract an easy approach to viewing visual art. Black and white flicker images, while often harsh and difficult for the viewer, create a necessary threshold to overcome. The works resist the viewer, or often, the other way around. Still images will read like minimal works but once set in motion will create the opposite effect.

At Issue Project Room, Kjell will be joined by Marc Ribot for an evening of improvised music and video.

Marc Ribot (pronounced REE-bow) was born in Newark, New Jersey in 1954. As a teen, he played guitar in various garage bands while studying with his mentor, Haitian classical guitarist and composer Frantz Casseus. In 1978, Ribot crossed the river to New York City, where he served as sideman for such musicians as jazz organist Jack McDuff and legendary soul shouter Wilson Pickett. Ribot began his five-year stint as a member of the Lounge Lizards (John Lurie’s innovative and influential Downtown jazz ensemble) in 1984.

Ribot also composed and recorded his own brand of Downtown soul music with his bands, Rootless Cosmopolitans and Shrek. In 1996 his recording DON’T BLAME ME, a solo reinvention of American standards, received praise from the Village Voice as “a record filled with savory and unlikely amusements.” In 1998 Atlantic Records released the critically acclaimed MARC RIBOT Y LOS CUBANOS POSTIZOS, featuring Ribot’s beautifully slanted interpretations of material by the great Cuban songwriter Arsenio Rodriguez. In 2001, Atlantic released SAINTS, a solo work where Marc turned well known tunes such as The Beatles “Happiness is a Warm Gun” and Leonard Bernstein’s “Somewhere” into left of center spacey sound collages.

Today, Marc continues to perform with his own bands, including the hard rocking Ceramic Dog and an Albert Ayler influenced group Spiritual Unity. Marc continues to be an active studio musician, prominently featured on Tom Waits’ latest release “Real Gone,” Medeski Martin and Wood’s “End of the World Party,” a solo record by T Bone Burnett and scores for “Walk the Line,” “Everything is Illuminated” and “The Departed.” Marc has also recently composed original scores for the PBS documentary “Revolucion: Cinco Miradas,” and the film “Drunkboat,” starring John Malkovich and John Goodman.

8pm $10