John Cage’s 4’33”

For the Pluto Project (making rocks) we mashed up John Cage’s masterwork 4 minutes and 33 seconds with the New Horizon’s 2015 flyby of Pluto. This interested me for a number of reasons. The two, being from differing domains (music & space) has a high degree of (radical) difference. Because we had committed to a convivial event we used the forms of a musical performance with a following reception. Cage piece provided both a ‘differing experience for most and it was possible to spontaneously created a performance group & audience with no rehearsals or much explanation. And it had the important absurdity, irony, and unclear meanings. The absurdity because it captures attention & provides a different perspective to our already present perception of the world. Irony because it provided for humor and enjoyment of the heady topics of both the Cage and the flyby. Open meaning was a tool to explore the possible meanings available between the two. I’ve got three readings so far, do you have one?

The entire printed pages of the score for 4’33” available from Boosey & Hawkes publisher.

When ice mountains meet nitrogen plains

For the Making Rocks project the team and I met with Bryan Holler, here with Professor Russo, holding a Pluto plate with his poem to Pluto on the back. Got more compliments yesterday at a meeting on another possible project on the CU/Boulder campus!

One of several posters made for the Pluto/Gage event in December. This one takes an image of when the nitrogen plains meets the ice mountains on Pluto. A quick mirroring & and repetition and viola!!

Making Rocks for Pluto

From 3 months of research & development,
came over 50 commemorative ceramic plates! As part of new ‘Aesthetics to Engineering’ course housed between the Engineering departments & the Art department at UC/Boulder, two interns & I developed a convivial event celebrating the New Horizon’s 2015 fly by of the dwarf planet Pluto. At the center of the event was the production of a nine sided ceramic plate embossed with surface feature from Pluto. With posters, a performance of John Cage’s masterpiece 4′ 33″, sweet treats and a reading of a poem, written by a Doctoral candidate who was involved in the Pluto mission, it was a fun and fulfilling adventure. Very thankful to my good friend Martha Russo who taught the class and helped to shepherd the project along.
NASA images from the fly by here.