2024 Fay Chandler Faculty Creativity Grant
Deconstructed Anthems is a series of compositions, instruments, performances and installations that portray black incarceration in the US using data from the US Department of Justice. Ekene Ijeoma programmed an algorithmic composition that sonifies the over 1.5 million people who were removed from their communities from 1925 to today by repeating The Star-Spangled Banner while removing notes at the increasing incarceration rates.
Deconstructed Anthems: Massachusetts will be presented as a solo exhibition in the Cyclorama at Boston Center for the Arts. The exhibition includes a custom player piano and over 1400 drawings of the composition. Ijeoma programmed the custom computer-controlled piano to hold down notes at the same rates as in the composition. The piano will be performed by different musicians every evening.
Previous performances featuring jazz musicians like Kris Bowers, Ambrose Akinmusire, and Burniss Earl Travis were presented at The Day for Night Festival (2017), Kennedy Center (2018), The Arts Club of Chicago (2019), and Bemis Center for Contemporary Art (2021).
Deconstructed Anthems: Massachusetts
*special performances by different musicians each evening from 7:00pm-8:00pm (EST)*
Tuesday, February 13 | 5:00pm-9:00pm (EST)
Wednesday, February 14–Friday, February 16 | 3:00pm-9:00pm (EST)
Saturday, February 17 | 1:00pm-9:00pm (EST)
Register HERE
Cyclorama, Boston Center for the Arts
539 Tremont Street, Boston, MA 02116
Artist Ekene Ijeoma presents the Boston premiere of his deeply moving installation and performance Deconstructed Anthems: Massachusetts in the historic Cyclorama at Boston Center for the Arts (BCA) daily from Tuesday, February 13 through Saturday, February 17, 2024, with a series of free, special performances by different musicians each evening.
More information HERE
Ekene Ijeoma, Assistant Professor in Media Arts and Sciences at MIT, is an artist who focuses on the overlooked or shared aspects of socio-political trends and interpersonal dynamics through the lenses of personal observation and analytical exploration. His works include sound, video, sculpture, installation, and performance.
Biography: MIT Media Lab Poetic Justice Group
Website: studioijeoma.com
Social: Instagram
NPR, “This Audio Portrait Of The 2020 Census Asks: Whose Voices Really Count?”
Hyperallergic, The Art of Slowing Down with Laurie Anderson, Ekene Ijeoma, and Ryoichi Kurokawa
The Modern Arts Notes Podcast: Episode number 501: Ekene Ijeoma and Chloë Bass.