This spring the Walker Art Centre will present the first-ever monograph and museum show by interdisciplinary artist Jason Moran. This exhibition features the full range of Moran’s work, from performance and collaborations with visual artists to his own sculptural works.

The work of Jason Moran is grounded in musical composition, yet bridges the visual and performing arts through stagecraft. Moran is known for using personal experience to create dynamic musical compositions that challenge the conventional form of the medium. His experimental works embrace the intersection of objects and sound, pushing beyond the traditional staged concert or sculpture to amplify ways that both are inherently theatrical.

In all aspects of his work, Moran’s creative process is informed by one of the essential tenets of jazz music: the “set” in which musicians come together to engage in a collaborative process of improvisation, riffing off of one another to create the musical experience. The exhibition will highlight Moran’s mixed-media “set” installations STAGED: Savoy Ballroom 1 and STAGED: Three Deuces (both 2015), sculptural vignettes based on storied music venues from past eras that were his acclaimed contributions to the 2015 Venice Biennale. The presentation includes the premiere of a new sculptural commission from this series that takes inspiration from the celebrated New York jazz venue Slugs’ Saloon, which was open from 1964 to the early 1970s.

The presentation also features a selection of Moran’s most recent charcoal drawings and time-based media works from his long-standing collaborations, or sets, with visual artists including Lorna Simpson, Glenn Ligon, Joan Jonas, and Stan Douglas and Theaster Gates. In-gallery performances and a new commission for the stage will be orchestrated during the run of the show.

The exhibition is curated by Adrienne Edwards and Danielle Jackson.

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RELATED EVENTS
Jason Moran with Ryan Trecartin and Lizzie Fitch:
Jazz Fest May 18th & May 19th 2018, 8pm
McGuire Theater, $35 ($28 Walker Members)

“Not only a pianist and composer but also a fluent traveler in the realm of contemporary art.” —New York Times Celebrated jazz pianist/composer/visual artist Jason Moran returns to the Walker to present a new multimedia performance that examines the various ways jazz functions: as freedom music, as a model of democracy, and as a prop. The work features Moran’s trio the Bandwagon (with bassist Tarus Mateen and drummer Nasheet Waits) in collaboration with prescient artists Lizzie Fitch and Ryan Trecartin, whose narrative-driven video installations explore the fluid nature of identity, community, and cultural subjectivity.

Walker Commission/World Premiere

walkerart.org