Reviews
CatSynth regularly features reviews of music and art. The focus is on modern, contemporary or experimental work in a variety of media. We primarily cover the San Francisco Bay Area, but occasionally find ourselves in New York or such far away locales as an electronic music show in Tokyo or an underground club in Shanghai.
Check out the featured review below as well as other recent reviews. If you are interested in having your event or work reviewed on CatSynth, please contact us or leave us a suggestion on Facebook. Note that with a volunteer staff of one human and one cat, we probably won't get to all of them.
Featured Article: Berkeley, Pacific Film Archive, Le Bonheur
I actually don’t get back to the Berkeley campus or its surroundings very often, and when I do, it’s usually on the north side where my graduate-school life centered: the computer-science or computer-music centers, the winding roads of the hills, or the “gourmet ghetto.” It’s pretty rare that I find myself on Telegraph [...]
On Kawara, MAR. 16, 1993
Today, we consider a work from the Today series by conceptual artist On Kawara. Since 1966, he has created many paintings in this long series, each consisting of the date the painting was created in simple white lettering set against a black background.
By coincidence, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) has in [...]
Conduct Your Own Orchestra Night
Last Thursday, I participated in Outsound Presents Conduct Your Own Orchestra Night at the Luggage Store Gallery. During the course of the evening, several conductors took turns conducting an “orchestra” of improvising musicians for ten minutes. Each conductor took a very different approach, using a variety of gestures, instructions and symbols to [...]
Truong Tran: the lost & found
Another review of art from the month that has past. In mid-February, I attended an artist talk with Truong Tran, part of a month-long exhibition of his work at Mina Dresden Gallery. The exhibition was presented by our friends at Kearny Street Workshop.
The gallery itself is a narrow and starkly white space. [...]
William Leavitt, Boyce/Greenlief duo and Karl Evangelista trio
I continue to work through the backlog of art and music reviews by presenting some of the openings and performances I saw on the particularly busy and fun evening of February 19 here in San Francisco. Although the evening included both musical performances and exhibitions of visual art, music was present as [...]
Anthony Discenza: Everything Will Probably Turn Out OK
With the month-long string of performances mostly behind me, I am trying to work my way through my backlog of reviews. Today we at CatSynth present a recent exhibition by artist Anthony Discenza at Catherine Clark Gallery entitled Everything Will probably Work Out OK. That phrase has become a bit of a mantra [...]
Joshua Lutz Meadowlands, and First Thursday SF
Initially, I had not planned to attend First Thursday this month, given all the music shows and such. But at the last minute I decided to venture out on a very rainy evening and found some surprises.
First, I visted Robert Koch Gallery, where I have found several interesting photography exhibitions over the past year. [...]
Reconnaissance Fly at Studio 1510, Oakland
A few photos and thoughts from last Friday’s Reconnaissance Fly performance at Studio 1510 in Oakland.
I knew that Studio 1510 had a great acoustic piano, which I wanted to take advantage of particularly for our piece Emir Scamp Budge which features an extended jazz piano solo. But it turns that they also now have [...]
Reconnaissance Fly at KUSF
Here is the first photo of the current Reconnaissance Fly lineup, taken after our performance on KUSF today.
[Photo by Bryan Chandler]
Thanks to our host Bryan Chandler for the photo, and of course for the opportunity to play.
Here is a photo I took at the start of the set.
You can see the score for our opening [...]
SF Thomassons Performance Tour
Two Saturdays ago, I attended the SF Thomassons Performance Tour, a collaboration by Kearny Street Workshop and Kaya Press that paired live performance art and installations with examples of hyperart, otherwise known as Thomassons, around San Francisco.
The tour was inspired by the book HYPERART: THOMASSON by Japanese conceptual artist and writer Akasegawa Genpei. Genpei [...]
LoveTech SF 1st Anniversary Epictacular
We present a few photos and notes from the LoveTech SF 1st Anniversary “Epictacular”, which I attended on Saturday. LoveTech is a “Collaborative Music Technology Party & Interactive Multimedia Art Salon” here in San Francisco, and a group I definitely should try and be more involved in during its second year.
Our friend Tim Thompson, [...]
