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The hit installation “Seussian Arkestra,” from Noel Night 2015 will return bigger and better to Dlectricity 2017! Jake Chidester + Alisyn Malek are back, building on the piece to present “The Expanded Seussian Arkestra.”

“The Expanded Seussian Arkestra” is a sculptural installation, combining the whimsical aesthetic of Dr. Seuss with the sonic expression of legendary jazz composer Sun Ra’s Arkestra ensemble. The installation is an interactive experience where each sculpture brings a different sound to create the overall composition.

Chidester and Malek own Corktown Studios, an artist collective and exhibition space in North Corktown. As stated on their website, “Corktown Studios, in conjunction with complementary rejuvenation projects in the neighborhood (hospitality, housing, agriculture) aims to contribute to the emerging identity of the area as a diverse and accessible hub for community-oriented creatives.”

Chidester also works as an architect and designer. He recently co-designed Bedrock’s new headquarters. Malek was one of Crain’s Detroit Business’ “Twenty in their 20s” in 2014 for her impressive schedule of working as an investment manager for GM Ventures and simultaneously running a gallery. With a background in engineering and a foot in both art and business, she is certainly one of the most interesting creatives in the Detroit scene today. Check out another article about Malek here.

Also be sure to check out the pair’s WAWAD wire car in the online gallery here!

Thank you so much to Clark Hill for their generous support of this project! The project will be located on the grounds of the Rackham Building at Woodward and Farnsworth.

German duo Martin Mayer and Quirin Empl (better known as mayer + empl) are bringing their 3D mapping project “Architectural Space Intervention” to Dlectricity 2017!

Accomplished 3D video mappers, the pair constructs interior and exterior installations that track the architectural elements of a space and reconstruct them virtually in order to change the usual perception. Their installations also record the sounds and noises of visitors and play them back as part of the installation. Space is given a life of its own.

For Dlectricity, mayer + empl’s project “architectural space intervention” will be located at the Mike Kelley Mobile Homestead at MOCAD. The projection will use white lines to trace the space, highlighting architectural elements. Infrared depth cameras will track visitors entering the installation, so that their bodies are then transformed into silhouettes and projected as white lines along with the architecture.

Most recently, they exhibited at the Museum Haus der Kunst in Munich and the Spring Attitude Festival in Rome in 2016.

Thank you so much to MOCAD for hosting this project!

Check out other installation videos on their website here.

Collaborators Aaron Jones and Wesley Taylor are bringing their piece “The Underground” to Dlectricity!

Using hot-wire milled foam, Jones and Taylor will create an architectural model that both physically and metaphorically illuminates the creative spaces in Detroit operating outside mainstream pop imagery. The foam will be carved with volumes and voids reminiscent of caverns, catacombs and cathedrals—spaces that exist below “above ground” urban depictions of the city.

Most recently, they have collaborated on work for the Complex Movements collective. Their interactive multimedia installation piece “Beware of the Dandelions” put a spotlight on community advocacy, citizenship and social change. Described by Complex Magazine as “a Detroit artist collective that you need to know,” Complex Movements includes Taylor as a member and Jones as a contributor—he designed the pod structure in which “Beware of the Dandelions” performances take place.

Both graduates of Cranbrook Academy of Art, Jones and Taylor have worked together in the past as co-directors of Talking Dolls, an experimental studio in Detroit, where Taylor still works as a co-director. Talking Dolls will be holding design workshops beginning August 12—be sure to check them out!

Jones has work on display at Volume Gallery in Chicago, IL, on view now through August 26. In the past, he collaborated with another Dlectricity artist, Carrie Morris, to create structures that keep public space clean in Hamtramck. He also works as an assistant professor at Lawrence Technological University.

Taylor remains a lead artist with the Complex Movements collective–check out another article here. He also works as an emcee and graphic designer for Detroit Hip Hop group Athletic Mic League. Check out an impressive documentary about Taylor and his work here.

We are so excited to have their work on display at the Rackham Building at Woodward and Warren. Thank you so much to Wayne State University for hosting this project!

Luxloop is a collective focused on using technology to change the world, tell stories and create engaging experiences that evoke wonder.

Their work is interactive and playful, using digital technology to enhance reality rather than replace it. The project they are bringing to Dlectricity,”If The Walls Had Eyes,” is rooted in reality—it uses images of real human eyes and projects them using Microsoft Kinect technology that responds to human motion. The eyes of the installation follow the viewer, raising questions about privacy in the digital age.

Based in NYC and Los Angeles, Luxloop was named winner of the 2015 3M Art and Technology Award Competition for their project “Overheard,” a narrative app launched at the Minneapolis Institute of Art. Standing near different pieces of art in the galleries while using the app sets off different audio content, with “overheard” snippets of conversation on topics ranging from the artwork itself, other nearby pieces or something unrelated entirely.

Luxloop is made up of the duo Ivaylo Getov and Mandy Mandelstein. They use technology to send a message through their work, but remain adamant about art that uses technology remaining art and not being overshadowed by the technology involved. Check out Ivaylo Getov’s thoughts on this here!

“If The Walls Had Eyes” will be located at the Detroit Artists Market (DAM). Thank you so much to DAM for hosting this project!

We are so excited to welcome Rashaad Newsome, headlining artist of Dlectricity 2017!

Newsome is committed to engaging with the city of Detroit through a summer residency leading up to the festival as he prepares three pieces for Dlectricity 2017.

Newsome’s practice brings together video, music, collage, and performance. He is known in the art world for reclaiming the vogue scene in his work—the artful 1970s underground queer ballroom dance scene, brought into the mainstream by Madonna in the 1990s that Newsome aims to take back for the queer black community.

For the production of his vogue-themed video work, Newsome makes a point of hiring actual vogue performers as a way to give the community visibility in the art world. Newsome told the New York Times Style Magazine, “Just by putting these bodies within an institutional art-world context is already a major statement, because I didn’t see work like or about this ever in a museum or gallery until I started making it.” Check out the rest of his interview here.

Newsome was born in New Orleans and these roots inform much of his work, particularly the staging of his “King of Arms” New-Orleans-style procession on Friday, September 22, at 7:00 p.m., circling the Detroit Institute of Arts to kick off Dlectricity 2017.

Newsome received the 2017 Rush Arts Gold Rush Award and is part of the 2017 NY Live Arts Live Feed residency program. He has exhibited and performed at the Studio Museum in Harlem, The National Museum of African American History and Culture in DC, The Whitney Museum in NYC, The Brooklyn Museum, MoMAPS1 in NYC, as well as numerous other locations nationally and internationally.

Currently, Newsome has work at MOCA Jacksonville, FL as part of the “Synthesize: Art + Music” exhibition, on view now through September 24.

Newsome also has a solo show at MMoCA in Madison, WI, showcasing both early and recent video work documenting vogue culture, on view now through December 3.

Thank you so much to Hyphen, an artist management firm founded by Andrea Glimcher, for proposing Rashaad Newsome as the 2017 Dlectricity artist-in-residence.

Thank you so much to the Knight Foundation for their generous support of this residency, and to the Detroit Institute of Arts for hosting all three of Newsome’s projects.

Check out a studio visit and interview with Newsome from 2016 here.

Check out an interview with Saint Heron, a collective album produced by Solange Knowles (Newsome designed the cover art) here.

Cleveland-based neon master Jeffry Chiplis is coming to Dlectricity!

Chiplis has been a fixture in the art world for decades. He has shown work at White Box Gallery in New York as well as at the Scope Art Fair. His use of neon as a primary material makes him stand out from his peers; he was featured in a solo spread in Art in America.

Through it all, he has remained loyal to Cleveland and to his use of repurposed neon. In an interview with CoolCleveland.com, he jokes that he avidly “upcycled” before it was “trendy” to do so.

For Dlectricity, Chiplis is bringing an iteration of his “Neon Repoetry” series, recycling letters and shapes from neon signs to write original poems and create visual installations. Removing neon tubes from their original context allows them to take on new meaning. Chiplis welcomes open interpretation of his poems and his work.

In his spare time, Chiplis is a collector of carrot memorabilia and his collection of items numbers over 10,000. He is featured on the carrot museum website here.

Chiplis’ project will be located on the outer wall of the N’Namdi Center for Contemporary Art. Thank you so much to the N’Namdi Center for hosting this project!

One of only three artists coming to Dlectricity 2017 to have presented at all three festivals, Detroit-based collective Apetechnology is back!

Apetechnology combines tech and art to focus on the human relationship with technology. Referring to their work as “Detroit Retrograde Futurism,” the group looks back on the once-celebrated “future” with a critical eye.

The collective had a show at Public Pool Art Space in Hamtramck in 2016. Their piece “Slendrotron,” an electronic Gamelan orchestra that plays music randomly generated by a computer algorithm, was featured in a show of other multimedia work.

For Dlectricity 2017, Apetechnology is presenting “The Shadows of Slendrotron (The Monkey God’s Great Leap),” a robotic performance piece inspired by traditional Javanese puppetry that brings the “Slendrotron” orchestra to Dlectricity. “The Shadows of Slendrotron” includes the live performance of an adaptation of a play from the Hindu epic Ramayana using automation, puppeteering and robotics accompanied by music from the electronic Gamelan orchestra.

Apetechnology’s piece “MechanoShards” at Dlectricity 2014 explored synchronized motion, light, sound and musical composition using 20-foot tall mechanical constructions created to look like shimmering crystal shards.

Collective members Chip Flynn, Leith Campbell and Leo Garza will present “The Shadows of Slendrotron.” Flynn founded Apetechnology in 2002, returning to Detroit to hone in on aesthetic machine design; Campbell explores all forms of technology while simultaneously testing the limits of improvisation; Garza is a S.A.G. puppeteer who has recently done media modeling work for Disney/Pixar.

Thank you so much to The Knight Foundation and Bluewater Technologies for their generous support of this project!

Thank you so much to the Detroit Institute of Arts for hosting this project!

Michaela Mosher’s job as gallery coordinator at the N’Namdi Center for Contemporary Art makes her a key player behind-the-scenes of Detroit’s art world, but she is also an accomplished artist in her own right beyond her work as a coordinator and exhibition designer.

Originally from Flint and educated at CCS, Mosher is a multi-disciplinary artist with an emphasis on installation and performance. We are so excited to welcome her back to Dlectricity to present “PRIMETIME,” a project featuring multiple video installations and live performances curated by Mosher.

Mosher and Dlectricity curatorial and production manager Alivia Zivich will both be presenting video installations in the show, along with artists Katie Barkel, Oren Goldenberg and Chris Tysh, Kaio Huvaere and Matteus Huvaere, Ginny Martin, Oksana Mirzoyan, Clifford B. West and Harry Bertoia.

Theater company “A Host of People” (Sherrine Azab and Jake Hooker, with Torri Lynn Ashford, Aja Salakastar Dier, Karilú Alarcón Forshee, Chantel Gaidica, Chris Jakob, Billy Mark, Dorothy Melander-Dayton, Sam Moltmaker, and Maddy Rager) will present live performances of “Neither There, Nor Here,” an original multimedia interdisciplinary play directed by Sherrine Azab that examines the experiences of people with liminal identities of race, gender, culture and sexuality. Performers create dishes representative of their mixed identities, using the format of a cooking show to guide the work.

Mosher’s work in exhibition design is currently on view at the N’Namdi Center exhibition, “Round in Circles,” on view through August 26. The installation and performances for “PRIMETIME” will also be held at the N’Namdi Center. Thank you so much to the N’Namdi Center for hosting this project!

Check out her video work here.

Check out her website here.

Check out the current exhibit at N’Namdi Center that she designed here, on view through August 26!

FaShon Vega is a Detroit-based artist with a passion for design. He is creative director of The Bottega Art Campus, a creative performance and installation space that serves as a community art center. He also founded “GLoW: Detroit,” a mission to bring permanent light, art and safety to the streets of Detroit neighborhoods and works as a designer for “BANKAi: Academy for Heart and Design,” helping businesses update their branding.

Vega is passionate about creating art and light in his community, making him a perfect match to bring light to Dlectricity. His project “Star Tours,” in collaboration with THREE13 ACTION DESIGN, is part live action performance, part cosplay and part strolling installation. Multiple light “Stunt Saber” battles between the light forces and the dark forces armed with light sabers will take place throughout the evening, culminating in an epic battle at the end of the night. Performers will interact with audience members when not performing.

His new youtube channel Hate by Design will uncover through vlogs and “weekly dives” the way design impacts our daily lives. Subscribe here and learn design hacks, tips and tricks.

Thank you so much to Wayne State University for hosting this project. The Star Tours performances will take place on the green space at Woodward and Warren and other locations around the Dlectricity footprint. Be sure to take a photo with a Star Tours performer if you see one!

Three groups have donated their space, time and expertise to bring DLECTRICITY’s audience the best show in the state: Phoenix Free Running Academy and THREE13 AD have pulled together the state’s best tracures (parckour and free running enthusiasts), martial artists and stuntmen to transform Midtown Detroit into a galaxy far far away. Thank you so much to everyone contributing to this mobile, energetic and light-filled installation!

Pope.L, a Chicago-based artist who has been making public interventionist art for over twenty years, will present Reenactor at Dlectricity 2017. A video artwork projected on the façade of the Detroit Historical Museum, the work will run continuously throughout the festival weekend, day and night.

Pope.L writes, “I call Reenactor my Civil War film but the war I’m referring to is any great trauma that marks the land and its people such that ghosts are spawned and made restless in memories that haunt our living landscape.” Live music performances by Marcus Elliot and Ben Willis will accompany the video’s soundtrack during festival hours.

If you visited the Detroit Institute of Arts’ 30 Americans show last year, you may have seen video footage of The Great White Way, a performance piece by Pope.L that addressed social injustice by documenting the artist make a 22 mile crawl up Broadway in Manhattan while dressed in a Superman costume, completed over the course of nine years.

This year, he’s been getting a lot of attention from the art world. He was a VIA grant recipient for Artistic Production based on installations at Documenta 14 and had a solo show at Mitchell-Innes & Nash in New York. He also won the prestigious Bucksbaum Award at the 2017 Whitney Biennial for Claim (Whitney Version), an installation of walls creating a space covered inside and out with curing slices of baloney that raises questions about identity, community and healing. He will have a solo show at the Whitney in 2018.

Pope.L will also present Flint Water Project at Detroit artist-run gallery What Pipeline, on view September 7 through October 21, 2017. Flint Water Project is an art installation, a performance and an intervention that calls attention to the water crisis in Flint by bottling contaminated Flint tap water and selling it as an edition in Detroit. This week, he launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise money for the project.

As per the Kickstarter description, “When Pope.L was asked by What Pipeline to do a commission for Detroit, he felt that whatever he did it should not re-victimize the city as had been done too often in the past. What if Detroit could be the hero and come to the rescue of another midwest city in need?” More information at whatpipeline.com (or @whatpipeline) #whatpipeline #flintwaterproject

Special thanks to the Detroit Historical Museum for hosting this project and to the Knight Foundation and What Pipeline for their partnership in bringing Pope.L to Detroit.