At YYZ Artists’ Outlet, Toronto BY BLOUIN ARTINFO
October 02, 2017
In a musical installation, the YYZ Artists’ Outlet presents ‘Report’. ‘Report’ is the latest work of American composer Raven Chacon, who in this production explores the musicality of firearms. The original presentation will be presented at the Toronto venue until early December.
Raven Chacon was originally trained as a classical composer. His works spread across a variety of mediums including installation, video, performance, and recording. In this show, he considers the outermost boundaries of an important parameter of sound: dynamics and volume. The voices of nature and unorthodox instruments contrast against a landscape of silence, sometimes explained in a score of music notation, text, or other pictorial depictions. This show is a musical composition scored for an ensemble playing various caliber firearms. The sonic potential of handguns, rifles, revolvers, and shotguns are utilized in a tuned discord of percussive blasts interspersed with voids of timed silence.
Chacon holds an MFA in Music Composition from California Institute of the Arts. He is a performer of experimental noise music, composer of chamber music, and an installation artist. He is a member of the American Indian arts collective, Postcommodity and performs regularly as a solo artist as well as with numerous ensembles in the Southwest USA. His work was recently exhibited at the 2017 Whitney Biennial and Documenta 14. The artist lives and works in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
This exhibition runs through December 2, 2017, at YYZ, 140-401 Richmond St. W. Toronto, ON M5V 3A8.