upcoming grant deadline: 05/15/2024

upcoming grant deadline: 05/15/2024

back to blog

Martha McDonald (ACG ‘14) exhibits Music for Modernist Shapes

Marginal Utility gallery
319 North 11th Street, 2nd floor
Philadelphia, PA 19107

Opening Reception:
Friday, Nov. 2, 6pm – 10pm

Performances: Saturday, Nov. 3, and Sunday, Nov. 4, at 2pm + 4pm
Saturday, Jan. 12, and Sunday, Jan. 13, 2019 at 2pm + 4pm

FREE but space is limited so RESERVATIONS ARE REQUIRED

Music for Modernist Shapes: Reimagining Spectodrama is an installation and performance inspired by Bauhaus alums Irene and Xanti Schawinsky’s 1936 theater piece made with students at Black Mountain College. The original performance included folded paper costumes, light projections and live music. McDonald’s installation features video, folded paper sculptures and costumes, and other objects inspired by the Schawinsky’s historic piece. McDonald and composer/multi-instrumentalist Laura Baird will activate McDonald’s installation of objects and costumes in a reimagined staging of Schawinsky’s Spectodrama, conjuring the memory of this little-known work from the experimental college’s rich performance history.

Music for Modernist Shapes features an original score by Laura Baird, which draws on archival scores from Schawinsky’s performance collaborations with Black Mountain College music teacher John Evarts, avant garde music from 1936 and Appalachian folk songs from the Black Mountain region. McDonald developed this project as an artist-in-residence at Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center in 2017.

RSVP on Marginal Utility's website.

back to blog back to top