CAST Visiting Artists Articles

Matthew Ritchie at the ICA, where the British-born, New York-based artist had an 18-month residency. Credit: Aram Boghosian for The Boston Globe.

An Artist Inquires into the Computational Substrate at MIT

Matthew Ritchie researches technology’s growing scope as CAST visiting artist. Matthew Ritchie is no stranger to the MIT campus. The contemporary artist, who works in installation, performance, painting, drawing, sculpture and sound, created a site-specific installation at the Zesiger Center … Continued

Judith, Workshop Performance created by CAST Visiting Artist Karin Coonrod and MIT professor Diana Henderson. Courtesy of the artist.

Karin Coonrod Envisions a Medieval Heroine for Modern Times

Judith Workshop Presentation Tuesday, March 5, 2019 / 7:30pm MIT Building W97 345 Vassar Street, Cambridge, MA The innovative theater director discusses Judith and her CAST residency with Professor Diana Henderson. All hail Judith, the female Beowulf! The medieval heroine … Continued

Lisa Dwan’s performance at the Old Vic Theatre of "No’s Knife," a selection of Samuel Beckett’s ‘Texts for Nothing’ (1950-52). Credit: Manuel Harlan.

Breathing New Life into Samuel Beckett

Reserve your ticket to “A Body of Beckett,” part of the MIT Performing series February 21, 2019 / 7pm MIT Theater Building W97, 345 Vassar Street, Cambridge, MA Actress-director Lisa Dwan shares her somatic take on the Irish bard as … Continued

Drunk and...soon to be FAMOUS!!! Featuring Shasta Geaux Pop Shot & Edited by Tatiana McCabe.

Shasta Geaux Pop Raises the Roof and Opens the Cultural Floodgates

Reserve your ticket to Line by Line, part of the MIT Performing series February 15, 2019 / 8:00pm MIT Theater Building W97, 345 Vassar Street, Cambridge, MA Ayesha Jordan brings her mega-party persona and work-in-progress to MIT Performing When Shasta … Continued

Adrienne Truscott. Credit: Allison Michael Orenstein. © 2018 Adrienne Truscott.

MIT Performing Shifts into High Gear

The season continues, presenting the work of three powerhouse talents.    The inaugural season of MIT Performing—the new presenting platform for contemporary performance—returns for a swift-but-powerful mini-festival, which runs through February. Jay Scheib, professor for Music and Theater Arts at … Continued

Adrienne Truscott’s THIS.

What the Hell is THIS?

Provocateuse Adrienne Truscott brings her wickedly funny new work to MIT. One of the best anecdotes in Adrienne Truscott’s delightedly vulgar, rampantly feminist, genre-shifting solo-show THIS is about a toilet. Specifically, it’s about a toilet in a camper in a … Continued

Image: Ben Bloomberg SM '14. Credit Justin Knight.

Sound and Technology Unlock New Innovation at MIT

Sound is a powerfully evocative medium, capable of conjuring authentic emotions and unlocking new experiences. This fall, several cross-disciplinary projects at MIT probed the technological and aesthetic limits of sound, resulting in new innovations and perspectives, from motion-sensing headphones that … Continued

IAP course A Brief History of Kanye will be on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 5pm. Image of Kanye West performing at Lollapalooza on April 3, 2011 in Chile. Credit: Wikimedia/Rodrigo Ferrari.

For Your Edification and Enjoyment: A Guide to Arts IAPS 2019

2019 IAP ARTS COURSES Dig into the history of Kanye West. Push the boundaries of 3D video. Share your favorite poem. Play the flute. Experiment with holography. Paint. Draw. Dance. Sculpt. Print. Exercise your mind and explore your inner artist … Continued

NERVOUS/SYSTEM by Andrew Schneider and Company: Jamie Roach. Photo by Sham Sthankiya.

Andrew Schneider’s NERVOUS/SYSTEM Boldly Launches the Inaugural Season of MIT Performing

Bringing Andrew Schneider and Company to MIT Albert Einstein once said of his teaching style, “I never teach my pupils, I only attempt to provide the conditions in which they can learn.” That quote essentially describes how OBIE award-winning performer, … Continued

Jacob Collier's newest album "DJESSE Vol. 1" is the follow up recording to the 2017 double Grammy-winning "In My Room."

A Jazz Wunderkind, A Haitian Pop Star and Spider Webs at MIT Sounding Series

Album Release Celebration: Djesse Volume 1 What do a jazz wunderkind, a Haitian pop star and spider webs all have in common? They’ll all be making appearances throughout the MIT Sounding Series 2018-19 season. The series kicks off with a familiar … Continued

Ini Oguntola. Photo by L. Barry Hetherington. Jacob Collier's MIT concert 2

Student spotlight: Clarinetist Ini Oguntola ’19

When people think of the clarinet, they may conjure images of Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, Pete Fountain or Sabine Meyer. On Friday, May 11, 2018 however, audiences will be treated to the talents of MIT’s own Ini Oguntola, who will … Continued

Pedro Reyes, Manufacturing Myschief,Noam Chomsky. Credit: HErickson/MIT.

Object Lesson: Noam Chomsky Puppet

Object Lesson is an ongoing blog series that highlights some of the art, artifacts, machines, devices, books, instruments and tools that give physical form to ideas that enhance the MIT campus and community. What is the Noam Chomsky puppet? This … Continued

Aerocene. Credit: KHigginsMIT

MIT Arts Events at the 2018 Cambridge Science Festival

Every spring, the Cambridge Science Festival (CSF) makes science accessible, engaging and fun for everyone through multifaceted, multicultural events. In spring 2018, Arts at MIT created a list of of CSF events that taking place on the MIT campus. We … Continued

Agnieszka Kurant, Hacking Arts *Signature Hack*, 2017. Credit: Adam Harr Horowitz.

Behind the Artwork: Adam Haar Horowitz on The Animal Internet

Adam Haar Horowitz, together with Agnes Cameron, Ishaan Grover, Tim Robertson, Owen Trueblood and Gary Zhang, worked with CAST Visiting Artist Agnieszka Kurant at the 2017 Hacking Arts Festival on a “signature hack,” a new feature of the festival that … Continued

(Clockwise, from top left) Clarinetists Don Byron, Billy Novick, Eran Egozy and Evan Ziporyn.

The Great Clarinet Summit Shines A Light On An Oft-Overlooked Instrument

The Clarinet The clarinet is not generally considered the most heroic of instruments. In classical music, that honor belongs to the violin. In jazz, it’s the saxophone; in rock, the guitar. But the clarinet, a single reed woodwind that is … Continued

Aerocene. Credit: KHigginsMIT

Object Lesson: Aerocene Explorer

Object Lesson is an ongoing blog series that highlights some of the art, artifacts, machines, devices, books, instruments and tools that give physical form to ideas that enhance the MIT campus and community.   What is the Aerocene Explorer? The … Continued

Jason Levine livecoding at an Algorave. Photo: Courtesy of the artist.

‘The Instrument is Code:’ Jason Levine Brings Musical Live Coding To MIT

It’s not uncommon, in this day and age, to go to a concert and spot a performer hunched behind a laptop. Head bobbing and fingers flying, she may be doing any number of things: DJing, remixing, playing live backing tracks. … Continued

2017 Hacking Arts, "Signature Hack" with CAST Visiting Artist Agnieszka Kurant. Credit: Sharon Lacey.

Collectively Powered Animatronic Fictional Animals, a “Signature Hack”

The Signature Hack At the 2017 Hacking Arts Festival, MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology (CAST) Visiting Artist Agnieszka Kurant worked with a team of MIT graduate students and researchers to create a “signature hack,” a new feature of … Continued

Pedro Reyes, Mexico City–based artist, named the first Dasha Zhukova Distinguished Visiting Artist. Credit: Chris Hind.

In the Making: Pedro Reyes

“My main material is my library. I consider that a very big palette,” says Pedro Reyes, the Mexico City-based artist known for his politically charged participatory and performative installations and multimedia works. “I feed myself materials twice as fast as … Continued

A Tribute to Lou Harrison Honors His Love Affair with Javanese Music

Lou Harrison The great American composer Lou Harrison tried his hand at many things: painting, calligraphy and poetry, to name but a few. He went through a great many musical phases as well, inspired by the experimental work of both … Continued

MIT Museum Presents North American Premiere of Groundbreaking Virtual Reality Experience The Enemy by Visiting Artist Karim Ben Khelifa.

CAST Announces 2017-18 Visiting Artists in Visual and Computational Arts

The MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology (CAST) is pleased to announce the 2017-18 Visiting Artists in visual and computational arts: Pedro Reyes, B. Stephen Carpenter II, Agnieszka Kurant, Diemut Strebe, Karim Ben Khelifa, Newton Harrison, Jason Levine and … Continued

Lou Harrison. Courtesy of the artist.

MIT’s Sounding Concert Series Is All About Coming Together

This fall sees the return of the MIT Sounding series—and, as usual, a penchant for border crossings and experimentation. The season kicks off on October 12 with a tribute concert to the influential composer Lou Harrison, who would have turned 100 … Continued

Grace Leslie. Courtesy of the artist.

Evan Ziporyn Discusses “Being Material”

MIT’s Nicholas Negroponte predicted in 1995 that “being digital” would have us entering a realm increasingly unconstrained by the materiality of the world. Two decades later, our everyday lives are indeed ever more suffused by computation and calculation. But unwieldy … Continued

Luciana Souza and Guillermo Klein. Image credit: Souza (left) by Kim Fox and Klein (right). Photo: Courtesy of the artists.

With “Works on Hope,” Latin Jazz Luminaries Guillermo Klein and Luciana Souza Invite MIT Into Their Tribe

Back in the mid-90s, the Brazilian-born singer Luciana Souza, who was living in Boston at the time, would sometimes drive down to New York to sit in on a Monday night session at the legendary Smalls Jazz Club in Greenwich … Continued

Jacob Collier. "Imagination Off the Charts," MIT, 2016. Photo: L. Barry Hetherington.

Out of his room, in his element: Jacob Collier harmonizes with MIT

A productive artist residency generally provides the yin to an artist’s yang. If daily life is distracting, for example, an artist may relish solitude. If, on the other hand, the artist is Jacob Collier, a self-contained singer-songwriter-performer-composer-arranger-producer who mostly works … Continued