ciénaga is a DJ based between Seattle, WA and Elko, NV. Coming from a background in performance, he wields music as a tool to invoke the theatre of the mind. For his REDEFINE mixtape, he does just that. Using a combination of pitched down trance bangers, bass-laden tech house, and obtuse...
In Coded Bias, a new documentary about Big Tech's infiltration into every corner of our lives, MIT Media Lab algorithms scholar and digital activist Joy Buolamwini makes a bold claim: "The progress of civil rights could be rolled back under the guise of machine neutrality." Buolamwini's prediction is then fleshed out...
In February 2020, artists Anida Yoeu Ali and Shin Yu Pai, served on the Arts Innovator Award (AIA) juror panel for the Seattle-based grantmaking organization, Artist Trust (AT). The AIA is the largest unrestricted award presently available for Washington State artists, funded by the Chihuly family and administered by AT....
Swathed in the unlikely comfort of warm grey tones, Toronto-based musician Hiroki Tanaka (田中博基) can be seen on the album cover for his debut solo record, Kaigo Kioku Kyoku (介護記憶曲), looking fairly somber in a space accented by Japanese relics and the simple adornments of a lived-in home. Diving deeper,...
Doubling as the dreamy, psychedel-ish music outfit Tan Cologne and the mysterious arts platform Psychic Sink, experimental musician Lauren Green and multi-hyphenate-creator Marissa Macias are incredibly generative collaborators. In 2014 and 2015, Green's desire to learn woodworking and Macias' pursuit of a cookbook project led each of them to Taos,...
For the past year, I have had a series of insightful conversations with Los Angeles-based visual artist and poet Emmanuel Whyte about art practice, travel as study, and about a series of his paintings. Most recently, about a series of paintings in which he covers parts of his body...
In the powerful new documentary, Since I Been Down, a swastika-tattooed man named Chad Walton explains that Taking Education and Creating History (T.E.A.C.H.) -- an initiative of the Black Prisoners' Caucus -- is best described as "prisoners lifting up prisoners." Officially founded in 1972, the Black Prisoners' Caucus is an...
Welcome to Libra season! It is heralded, appropriately enough, by an Equinox, when the days are as long as they are short. Libra is cardinal air: it initiates, but it can be hard to pin down, and its realm, as with all air signs, is the conceptual. Ruled by Venus, the...
Speak to interdisciplinary artist barry johnson for any substantial amount of time, and one quickly understands why his latest catchphrase, "anything is anything," has become an overarching mantra in his creative life. More than a simple trifecta of words; it is a philosophical well deep with meaning -- which can...
Photograph by Abe Mora Lightswitch, the six-track EP from New Zealand-based Persian rapper, CHAII, draws upon her visual art background and comes paired with six highly-stylized music videos that span continents. Including a three-part series shot in Oman -- which involves a rich roster of local residents and aims to portray...
In the directorial debut of their feature film, Borrufa, Portland-based artist, performer, and filmmaker Roland Dahwen presents a quiet portrait of the trials and tribulations faced by immigrant families in the United States. Poetically and ambiguously named, Borrufa is shot on Super 16mm film stock and unconventional by most mainstream filmmaking...
It’s an unassuming video. Just 17 minutes in length and made up of exactly what it’s title promises, Stack Until it Falls Down is redundant, slow, and rather dull. It’s also hypnotic, soothing, and exactly the meditation we all need right now. Born out of the COVID-19 lockdown that fundamentally altered...