Urban Video Project presents ‘Song Cycle for Haruki Murakami’ Oct. 18 in conjunction with Th3: A City-Wide Art Open

Urban Video Project presents ‘Song Cycle for Haruki Murakami’ Oct. 18 in conjunction with Th3: A City-Wide Art OpenOctober 04, 2007Erica Blustesblust@syr.edu

The Urban Video Project (UVP) will present “Song Cycle for Haruki Murakami,” its fifth volume of outdoor multimedia projections, on Thursday, Oct. 18, from dusk to 10 p.m. at 444 E. Genesee St. (across from the Fayette Firefighter’s Memorial Park).

“Song Cycle for Haruki Murakami” is a four-part sound and image composition by musicians/media artists Matthew Dotson and Bart Woodstrup. Curator of the show is the Avalanche Collective, an artist group led by three graduate students from Syracuse University’s College of Visual and Performing Arts: Blake Carrington, Christopher Gianunzio and Colin Todd. The screening is part of the fall season of UVP, which features international artists and coincides with the fall evenings of Th3: A City-Wide Art Open, which is held on the third Thursday of each month.

“By bringing in artists from outside Syracuse — and even the country — the artistic dialogue can further develop within the creative community as well as establish Syracuse as a notable playground for international video artists to experiment with new ideas and formats,” says Todd.

Based on four quotes from Murakami’s book “The Wind-up Bird Chronicle,” “Song Cycle for Haruki Murakami” attempts to create new narratives out of the fragments of the original structure. Dotson, the composer and sound designer, uses ambient sound recordings in addition to cello, drum, flute and clarinet solo performance to construct these new narratives. In response to the sound composition, Woodstrup creates stark imagery of elegantly animated text. The imagery imitates the themes of insect wings, earth, dust and lock by mapping the animation to elements of the sonic spectrum.

UVP, a public arts initiative seeking to bring art to the streets and buildings of Syracuse, features video and sound in an effort to explore new spaces for contemporary art. It is a platform for the presentation of multimedia artworks, reactivating underutilized urban spaces in the city’s downtown area.

Inspired by Syracuse’s Connective Corridor and Th3: A City-Wide Art Open, UVP is the brainchild of the 40 Below Public Arts Task Force and the Avalanche Collective. Working closely with a number of University and community partners, UVP produces a series of experimental outdoor video projections throughout the year.

The Connective Corridor is an urban entrepreneurial zone linking a vast array of arts and cultural venues, businesses and neighborhoods in Syracuse. Both a place to be and the site of a world-class urban design project, the Connective Corridor is a cultural and economic magnet for the region that engages the city of Syracuse, SU, arts and cultural organizations, and businesses as partners.

The Connective Corridor Shuttle Bus (Centro Route #543) will operate during the fall months on Thursdays from 5-11:40 p.m. and Fridays and Saturdays from 9:40 a.m.-11:40 p.m. The free shuttle service provides a convenient way to travel to cultural events and happenings at SU and in downtown Syracuse, including Th3. A route schedule/map for the Connective Corridor Shuttle Bus is available online at http://connectivecorridor.syr.edu.

For more information on UVP, visit http://urbanvideoproject.org. For more information on the Avalanche Collective, visit http://avalanchecollective.net.