Author: suki

  • It Could Be Wertz Sound + Visuals [strobing light | photosensitive viewers take great care]

    It Could Be Wertz

    Illustrator Michael Wertz convenes an ensemble of live drawing, hand-held projection, and improvised scoring with musicians Andy Cowitt, Michael Zelner and Suki O’Kane, with Super 8 by Nat Swope.

    The show includes periods of strobing light. Photosensitive viewers please take great care.

    About the Artists

    Michael Wertz
    photo by Andy Cowitt

    Michael Wertz is the Chair of the Illustration Program at California College of the Arts. In addition to Illustration, he teaches with Critical Ethnic Studies, Printmaking, and MFA Writing.

    As an illustrator and author, his client work covers the gamut, including The New Yorker; ESPN; the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Storycorps; Google; Fort George Brewery; Bay Area Bookfest; Fillmore Auditorium; Bay Area Rapid Transit; Peaches Christ; Vote Vote Vote; Nike; Camelbak; Converse; Camper Van Beethoven; Pottery Barn; Levi Strauss; and Rickshaw Bagworks.

    His work has received awards from Communication Arts, The Society of Illustrators (New York City), 3×3 Illustration, and American Illustration, (New York City.)

    Illustrated books include Golden Gate Park, an A to Z Adventure, (2020 West Margin Press); ABC Oakland, (2017 HeyDay Books).

    As a research scholar, he has spoken on West Coast drag at conferences in the US and abroad. His costume design, illustration and performance in drag was documented in “Mrs. Vera’s Daybook,” which aired on PBS in 2021 and is making festival rounds in 2022.

    Wertz maintains a vibrant gallery presence in the Bay Area and beyond, with work shown at HeyThere Projects in Joshua Tree (2022), Harvey Milk Photo Center, San Francisco (2021); Public Eye (2020 Publication); Giant Robot Los Angeles (2018); ICON Group Show: Red Bull House of Art, Detroit (2018); The Menagerie: Unrestricted Queer Artists, Alley Cat Books, SF (2018).

    Wertz’s nonprofit work includes Vote Vote Vote (2020), a project he designed that raised $26,000 for the ACLU Women’s Rights Project, in honor of Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

    An avid music fan, Wertz partnered over many years with legendary Santa Cruz surf-punk band Camper Van Beethoven. Wertz has been tapped to contribute work to the legendary poster series at The Fillmore, creating posters for John Spencer Blues Explosion, John Prine, and Smino. His publishing clients include Farrar, Strauss, Giroux; Chronicle Books; HeyDay Books; West Margin Press; Developmental Studies Center; and San Francisco Center for the Book.

    Wertz has worked as a design-build creative at Burning Man since 2003; during the pandemic, he taught screen-printing to Burners when the event was put on hold, to keep their gift-economy ethic robust. In addition, he founded the Elsewhere Philatelic Society, an art collective focused on public space reinterpretation, street art/environmental installation, and mail-art publications.

    https://www.instagram.com/wertzateria/

    Nat Swope is a Bay Area native whose influence stretches back to his youth skateboarding in the East Bay and beyond. In 2001, nat founded Bloom Screen Printing (aka Bloom Press) in Oakland, which he owned and operated until he joined Monolith Press in 2023. While at Bloom, Nat printed for some of the most influential and inspiring artists of the time.

    https://www.instagram.com/natswope/

    Andy Cowitt, Suki O’Kane, and Michael Zelner are long-standing sonic collaborators in projects with Big City Orchestra, B3CO, and Radio Dinner. They bring diverse interests in immersion composition, electroacoustic media ecology, noise, and drone to their tablecore aesthetic.

  • Thingamajigs Performance Group

    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.

  • We hit our goal!

    We hit our goal!

    In just nine days, the community has donated over $60,000 to ATA which means we’re able to stay current on our payment plan for our portion of the rent at 992 Valencia.

    With your support, we’re working out our long-term plan to continue serving the community sustainably, as are our partners at San Francisco Cinematheque, Shapeshifters Cinema, The Lab, and Roxie Theater. Please keep them in your hearts and wallets!
    There will be more opportunities to support in the coming weeks, so stay tuned to this place and our socials here, here, and here.
    ¡viva ATA!