Sound art pioneer Liz Phillips kicks off UMF Art Gallery season

FARMINGTON - The work of Liz Phillips — a pioneer in sound art — will kick off the UMF Art Gallery’s fall exhibition season with “Biyuu II: An Interactive Sound and Video Installation.” The exhibit is free and open-to-the-public and will run from Sept. 20-Nov. 4, including an opening reception from 5-8 p.m., Thursday, Sept. 20.

In her site-specific installation, “Biyuu II,” sound and video artist Phillips collaborates with Butoh dancer Mariko Endo Reynolds to create an interactive visual soundscape that responds to and transforms the natural actions of wind and water. Sensors trace the air currents outside the gallery and movement inside as people pass through the space, activating sounds and luminous imagery.

The title, “Biyuu,” is a Japanese word that suggests the sound of wind through bamboo. There will be daily scheduled interactions from 2:30-3 p.m., Tuesdays through Sundays, however, viewers are invited to perform/interact during all gallery hours.

In addition to this exhibit, Phillips will also present an artist’s talk, “The Resonance of Weather,” at 11:45 a.m., Wednesday, Oct. 31, in the Performance Space at the Emery Community Arts Center on the UMF campus. She will also participate in “Sound, Place and Performance,” a panel discussion with author/critic Josh Kun and musician Omar Tamez, also in the Performance Space at the Emery Community Arts Center.

New York-based artist Phillips has been creating responsive environments with new technologies for more than 40 years. She combines audio and visual art forms with new technologies to create responsive environments sensing wind, plants, fish, audience, dance, water and food. Her work has been exhibited at museums, alternative spaces, festivals and public spaces including The Milwaukee Art Museum, Queens Museum of Art, The Jewish Museum, The Whitney Museum of American Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Lincoln Center Festival, The Kitchen, and more. Her past collaborators include the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, Nam June Paik, Yoshi Wada and Simone Forti, among many others.

Mariko Endo Reynolds is a professional Japanese Butoh Dancer who trained in Tokyo with Akira Kasai, a co-founder of the Butoh movement. She toured Japan and the U.S. as a principal dancer in one of Japan’s Butoh companies.

This exhibition is made possible by the generous support of the David Bermant Foundation. It is a component of Sonitus: A Sound Studies University Forum at the University of Maine Farmington.

The UMF Art Gallery is located at 246 Main Street in Farmington, behind the Admissions Office. Gallery hours are Tuesdays – Sundays 12-4 p.m. and by appointment. For more information or to make an appointment please contact Sarah Maline at maline@maine.edu or call the gallery at 207-778-7002.