Thursday, January 24, 7:30-9:30 p.m.
Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center
56 Broadway in downtown Asheville
$7, $5 for BMCM+AC members and students w/ID
Co-sponsored by the Asheville Fringe Arts Festival and BMCM+AC
On Thursday, January 24th at 7:30p.m., The Black Mountain College
Museum + Arts Center and the Asheville Fringe Arts Festival will
present an evening devoted to two of the pivotal artists of the 20th
century, Robert Rauschenberg and John Cage. Robert Rauschenberg and
John Cage along with Merce Cunningham had been collaborators in
creating new visions in artistic expression and performance since
1952. Their unique creations explored a wild variety of media that
encompassed techniques, ideas and themes still reverberating through
today’s art world.
The event will be a multimedia presentation/lecture presented by Jim
Julien, co-director of the Asheville Fringe Arts Festival with visual
elements and information pertinent to Rauschenberg’s and Cage’s
impact on the world of performance art. It will include performances
of Cage pieces by UNCA Professor of Music Wayne Kirby with guest
musicians and others. A Cage-inspired and chance-based art piece
called “Modus Operandi” will be performed by Cilla Vee – Life Arts,
this collaboration features native British choreographer Claire
Elizabeth Barratt with Asheville, NC composer Elisa Faires.
John Cage first came to Black Mountain College in the summer of 1948
to teach music and was Composer in Residence at the College in 1953.
In the summer of 1952, Cage conceived of the event that has since
become known as the first “Happening” in this country, an unscripted
series of sequential and overlapping events within a strict time
structure. Cage was at the leading edge of the avant-garde, exploring
the unlimited possibilities of time-based work, prepared instruments,
ambient sound as music, and chance procedures.
Starting in 1949, Robert Rauschenberg studied at the Black Mountain
College in North Carolina under Josef Albers where he meets Merce
Cunningham and John Cage. Rauschenberg’s relentless curiosity and
joyful invention has made him one of the most fascinating and
unpredictable artist of our times. A Night Out With Bob Rauschenberg)
and John (Cage) is intended as an appreciation and an examination of
their unusual genius and contribution to modern art.
This event is the opening night event for the Asheville Fringe Arts
Festival and is being presented at the Black Mountain College Museum
+ Arts Center at 56 Broadway in downtown Asheville in partnership
with the Asheville Fringe Arts Festival. Please go to
www.blackmountaincollege.org or www.ashevillefringe.org for more
information.
“Modus Operandi” is funded in part through Meet The Composer's
MetLife Creative Connections program.
