Elastic Arts

04/23/2025

This Saturday our friends at AIRMW present Syzygia (Jeff Chan, Robbie Lynn Hunsinger, Jamie Kempkers, Michael Perkins). The program will open with an improvised piano/flute duo from Michael Perkins and Jeff Chan, followed by the full band Syzygia performance.

Program:

Set 1 - Improvised Sonata for Piano and Flute

The Improvised Sonata for Piano and Flute is an improvised work inspired by contemporary classical music. The piece is loosely structured on and follows the traditional sonata form.

Performed by Michael Perkins (piano) and Jeff Chan (flute)

Set 2 – Syzygia

Syzygia is a newly formed ensemble that performs improvised music and expands on the concepts stemming from pianist Michael Perkins and woodwind performer Jeff Chan’s development of the Improvised Sonata for Piano and Flute. This ensemble adds to the original duo of Perkins and Chan, with leading Chicago new/creative music artists Robbie Lynn Hunsinger and Jamie Kempkers completing the quartet.

04/22/2025

We are so pleased to host the opening reception of Serena Hocharoen’s solo exhibition ‘TV FOR A BUG’ this Friday!
The work is born not out of nostalgia, but out of a collection of dreams, collaged and pasted together over time.

Exploring the meaning of networks and the synthesis of collecting, the exhibition presents new and old works by the Chicago-based multi-disciplinary artist. As suggested by the title of the exhibition, their works play with scale and perspective, and call upon a new way of experiencing the mundane. Interested in the feeling of being underground, the visual gallery will be home to new leaf structures and video works presented through a 1-inch screen.

The opening reception is this Friday April 25th, from 6-9pm and is free admission. Join us!

04/22/2025

This Thursday we welcome improvising saxophonist Danny Kamins based out of Houston, TX with a trio including Jason Wayne Sneed, and Jerome Bryerton. We’ll then hear from a new exciting duo of Sarah Clausen and Caroline Jesalva. Music at 8:30pm!

8:30pm

Danny Kamins - soprano sax
Jason Wayne Sneed - bass
Jerome Bryerton - drumset

9:30pm

Sarah Clausen - saxophone
Caroline Jesalva - violin

04/22/2025

Early Bird ticket pricing for our annual benefit May 10th ends this Friday April 25th at midnight! The ticket includes incredible performances, an open bar with curated cocktails from Star Union Spirits and Illuminated Brew Works, dinner from L'Patron tacos, and a chance to celebrate and support our humble arts venue. Get your ticket today!

Artistic exploration from a versatile Chicago venue.

04/20/2025

TONIGHT!

SPECTRALINA!

Emily Beisel w/ Color Swim!

Open Jam!

8PM

04/19/2025

TONIGHT! Sunshine Lombre will present an evening of vibes & Poetry accompanied by the spellbinding Ohni on bass . Opening set by Manasseh & Marcus Darling.
Doors Open at 7:30pm & Show Starts at 8pm. Come through!

04/18/2025

TONIGHT!

The Elastro series welcomes solo sets from two traveling artists Matthew Ryals and Keith Vecker aka V. Vecker, and a duo from Heather Mease / Ben Zucker.

Ryals (he/him) is a New York City-based modular synthesist and composer-improviser whose music explores improvisation, generative systems, cybernetics, chance operations, and experimental archiving. In concert, Matthew takes a highly tactile approach to the modular synthesizer, with touch, intuition, and real-time responsiveness at the core of his performance.

V.Vecker(Keith Arthur Wecker, b. 1983) is a composer, improvisor, and multi-instrumentalist using technology to explore the timbral and temporal properties of granular synthesis in the creation of electroacoustic music. Keith puts a focus on bringing the in-between sounds to the forefront through a layering intensive process, creating rich sonic textures that evoke a meditative sonic environment for the listener to immerse themselves in.

Elastic curator Ben Zucker will collaborate as a duo with artist Heather Mease to open the evening. They will perform an anti-liminal multimedia collaboration with video contributions from UK animator Happisoft (https://happisoft.net). A roomful of eggs, the photonegative Dollar Tree, sad found footage, chamber vaporwave, unknowable cassettes...finally, a third dimension!

04/17/2025

This Sunday we present an evening of experimental sound and visuals at our Pleaides Series! We are thrilled to feature SPECTRALINA in the series for the first time, the audio-visual performance project of Dan Bitney and Selina Trepp. Working in an improvised format, Spectralina creates an image-sound relationship that treats each medium as equal, resulting in performances in which projection and sounds come together as visual music. Pleiades curator Emily Beisel will then be closing out a two-week spring tour in a special set with video collective Color Swim. Can’t wait to hear a tour-tight set from Emily’s mind-bending bass clarinet / electronics approach!

Following the live sets we’ll have the classic Pleiades Jam for all femme/nonbinary/trans artists, so bring your instrument! Hit up [email protected] to reserve your spot in the jam. Admission is FREE for all jammers.

04/16/2025

At this month’s Elastro series we welcome solo sets from two traveling artists Matthew Ryals and Keith Vecker aka V. Vecker, and a duo from Heather Mease / Ben Zucker.

Ryals (he/him) is a New York City-based modular synthesist and composer-improviser whose music explores improvisation, generative systems, cybernetics, chance operations, and experimental archiving. In concert, Matthew takes a highly tactile approach to the modular synthesizer, with touch, intuition, and real-time responsiveness at the core of his performance.

V.Vecker(Keith Arthur Wecker, b. 1983) is a composer, improvisor, and multi-instrumentalist using technology to explore the timbral and temporal properties of granular synthesis in the creation of electroacoustic music. Keith puts a focus on bringing the in-between sounds to the forefront through a layering intensive process, creating rich sonic textures that evoke a meditative sonic environment for the listener to immerse themselves in.

Elastic curator Ben Zucker will collaborate as a duo with artist Heather Mease to open the evening. They will perform an anti-liminal multimedia collaboration with video contributions from UK animator Happisoft (https://happisoft.net). A roomful of eggs, the photonegative Dollar Tree, sad found footage, chamber vaporwave, unknowable cassettes...finally, a third dimension!

04/14/2025

Join us this Wednesday for an extremely special event! Free admission for all members and students! Appointed by Nelson Mandela as a founding member of the Constitutional Court of South Africa, Justice Albie Sachs will screen a film of a tour he conducted of the court and the collection and engage in discussion afterward about the way in which art and justice interrelate. Sachs is a renowned South African freedom fighter, anti-apartheid activist, advocate, writer, and former judge on the Constitutional Court of South Africa. After the first democratic election in 1994, he was appointed by Mandela to serve on the newly-established court, from which he retired in the fall of 2009. He has also been engaged in the sphere of art and architecture, and played an active role in the development of the Constitutional Court building and its art collection on the site of the Old Fort Prison in Johannesburg. Justice Sachs will share his thoughts on art and justice.

We’ll then hear from Mbizo! Reprise for Johnny Dyani that includes a group of veteran improvisers exploring the music of South African musician Johnny “Mbizo” Dyani who relentlessly sought freedom for over two decades. From the day he jumped on a stage in South Africa to jam on a borrowed bass with Chris McGregor’s Blue Notes, then exiled in Europe, and next through dozens of boundary-breaking collaborations, Dyani’s mission was to set the music free. Refusing to bow to apartheid and colonialism, Dyani was “jumping a bass-line like hu***ng a landmine” (Lesego Rampolokeng). The group brings pieces prepared as part of South African-based Chimurenga’s presentation presented earlier this month to celebrate the life and legacy of Dyani. We’ll get started at 7:00pm!

6:30 pm -
Film screening from Albie Sachs with immediate artist discussion afterwards.

8:30 pm - Mbizo! Reprise for Johnny Dyani
Adam Zanolini - Bass, sax, flute, conga
Naydja Bruton - Drums
Fred Jackson - Sax, flute, percussion
Anaiet Soul - Keys
Dee Alexander - vocals
Ivan Taylor - bass

04/10/2025

TONIGHT! This week’s Improvised Music Series is seriously one not to miss. First the trio of Mai Sugimoto and Ed Wilkerson on woodwinds w/ Tim Daisy on percussion will play together for the first time. We’ll then hear from an intergenerational Double Drum Quintet featuring percussionists Vincent Davis and Lily Finnegan with Anisha Rush on saxophone, Emma Dayhuff on bass, and Will Greene on guitar/saxophone. High energy improvisation! Tonight at 8:30PM!

8:30 pm - Sugimoto/Wilkerson/Daisy
9:30 pm - Double Drum Quintet

04/09/2025

Have you grabbed your Elastic Arts 7th Annual Benefit Early Bird Tickets yet? What are you waiting for! We have a night full of performances, open bar style food/drink, a huge silent auction, and more. We’re especially excited for a 16-channel CLEAT performance from Haruhi Kobayashi and our Elastro series curator Paige Alice Naylor. These Chicago-based sound artists will blend voices and electronics to create an immersive, embodied experience for all attendees.

Paige is an experimental vocalist, sound artist and educator. Through sound-making and performance, she investigates time, perception, the breakdown of language, and themes of death. Her direct and interpersonal approach creates live sonic environments which feel vulnerable and intimate.

Haruhi is a sound artist and vocal performer, originally from Tokyo, where she began her career as a J-pop singer-songwriter. She explores the social and emotional connotations of voice, manipulating it into unidentifiable sounds to liberate it from its “human” constraints.

You better be there! Get your tickets today! Link in bio.

04/08/2025

This Saturday Freedom From and Freedom To returns for its first iteration of sound and movement collaborations for 2025 at Elastic Arts! FFFT is an exploration and celebration of artistic circumstance. Movement and sound improvisors from all around Chicago (and elsewhere!) gather in front of a live audience where they are grouped by chance, then performing an improvised 15 minute set. There will be a special opening set from musicians Kim Alpert, Chris Corsano, and Jayve Montgomery alongside dancer Irene Hsiao. Following we’ll have the 6 x 15 minute sets from on-the-spot lottery chosen ensembles. Don’t miss this! Saturday at 7pm!

Openers:

Musicians- Kim Alpert, Chris Corsano, Jayve Montgomery
Dancer- Irene Hsiao

Dancers

Solomon Bowser
Aaliyah Christina
Rahila Coats
Keiko Johnson
Kopano
Amanda Maraist
Chrissy Martin
Phree
Charles Pierson
Cristal Sabbagh
Ashaand Simone
Allen Turner

Musicians

Ben Billington
Tom Borax
Paige Brown
Hasani Cannon
Zaira Castillo
Caitlin Edwards
Jordan Knecht
Haruhi Kobayashi
Max Lazarus
olula negre
Graham Nelson
Julian Pujols Quall
Peter Redgrave
Scott Rubin
Brianna Tong
Sharon Udoh
Juliann Wang
Adam Zanolini

04/08/2025

Join us this Saturday for another edition of Shake Shook Shaken, a theater/movement workshop series produced by Julie Meckler.

Shake Shook Shaken is a dream of what a safe space could allow. A vision of a place for everybody to gather, look at each other, play and create in a non judgmental, trauma-informed way. It’s an invitation, a journey within and out, a surprise. Each workshop is unique. This month we’ll have Krissy Bergmark and Julie leading on the topic of REVOLUTIONS.

No prior dance or acting experience is necessary, just willingness to move and exhale. This workshop series is for anyone and everyone

What revolutions are happening within you?
How do internal and external cycles affect each other?
The joy of playing together will guide us to explore and create.
Let’s loop, walk, layer and build.

04/07/2025

This week’s Improvised Music Series is seriously one not to miss! First the trio of Mai Sugimoto and Ed Wilkerson on woodwinds + Tim Daisy on percussion will play together for the first time. Then an intergenerational Double Drum Quintet features percussionists Vincent Davis and Lily Finnegan with Anisha Rush on saxophone, Emma Dayhuff on bass, and Will Greene on guitar/saxophone. Also a first time collaboration as a unit, although members frequently play with one another. High energy improvisation! Thursday at 8:30PM!

8:30 pm - Sugimoto/Wilkerson/Daisy
9:30 pm - Double Drum Quintet

04/06/2025

TODAY!

Join us for another edition of Soft Power - A Deep Listening and Rest Session led by Angela James w/ Erica Miller, Sarah Clausen, and {ZìRán}. This offering by Angela James combines guided meditation, simple movement/breath work, and improvised ambient sound for deep communal relaxation. Participants will bring their own yoga mat and blanket to lie down comfortably on the floor and rest together. No experience or skill necessary, the goal is to unwind together and tune the parasympathetic nervous systems through breath and gentle sound. Meet us here today - Sunday 4/6 at 3pm

04/04/2025

One week from today we are excited to host legendary composer Carl Stone presenting live compositions for the 16 channel system. Stone is one of the pioneers of live computer music, and has used computers in live performance since 1986. He has been hailed by the Village Voice as “the king of sampling.” and “one of the best composers living in (the USA) today.”. RELIX has written that “Stone makes music that can hit your ear holes like a DMT flash.” We’ll have Chicago artists RXM Reality and Nicole Alonso presenting new work for the CLEAT system as well!

Chicago-based producer/composer Mike Meegan makes music under the monikers RXM Reality and When 2. Over the course of five albums on Hausu Mountain since 2018, along with 2021’s Advent LP on Orange Milk, Meegan refined a strain of electronic production that unites facets of breakcore, techno, grime, noise, and countless other styles into detailed composites that attest to his omnivorous tastes and bottomless technical acumen as a producer.

Nicole Alonso is a Chicago based experimental sound artist and musician. Her work blends sampling, sound manipulation, and live performance to explore themes of space, memory, and identity. She will be using Eurorack modules to present a sound collage featuring a variety of recordings she has collected that hold deep personal significance.

This is not one to miss. Friday April 11th !

04/03/2025

Tone Glow + Elastic Arts are excited to present “Under Some Kind of Hex: Love & S*x in the Films of Stan Brakhage” next Wednesday April 9th. This two-part program will feature 16 short films from Stan Brakhage. In 1963, the filmmaker noted in his book Metaphors on Vision that his works concern themselves with “birth, s*x, death, and the search for God.” The first program of this evening will feature 8 abstract works, including the six films that make up his ‘Lovesong’ series. The second program will feature 8 films grounded in actual people and places. All films will be shown on 16mm.

PROGRAM 1 AT 7PM
1. Thigh Line Lyre Triangular (1961, 6 mins)
2. Lovesong (2001, 11 mins)
3. Lovesong 2 (2001, 3 mins)
4. Lovesong 3 (2001, 9 mins)
5. Lovesong 4 (2001, 3 mins)
6. Lovesong 5 & 6 (2001, 1 min)
7. S*xual Saga (1996, 3 mins)
8. Untitled (For Marilyn) (1992, 11 mins)
TRT = 47 mins

PROGRAM 2 at 8PM
1. S*xual Meditation #1: Motel (1970, 7 mins)
2. S*xual Meditation: Room with View (1971, 4 mins)
3. S*xual Meditation: Faun’s Room, Yale (1972, 3 mins)
4. S*xual Meditation: Office Suite (1972, 4 mins)
5. S*xual Meditation: Hotel (1972, 7 mins)
6. S*xual Meditation: Open Field (1972, 6 mins)
7. Loving (1957, 5 mins)
8. Window Water Baby Moving (1959, 12 mins)
TRT = 48 mins

Tickets are $15 and can be purchased at link in bio or at the door. A single ticket is good for both programs. Tickets will be available at the door unless they sell out in advance, at which there will be a standby line. See you there!