Anthony Schmalz Conrad was an American video artist, experimental filmmaker, musician, composer, sound artist, teacher, and writer. Active in a variety of media since the early 1960s, he was a pioneer of both drone music and structural film. As a musician, he was an important figure in the New York minimalist scene of the early 1960s, during which time he performed as part of the Theatre of Eternal Music. He became recognized as a filmmaker for his 1966 film The Flicker. He performed and collaborated with a wide range of artists over the course of his career.
Faust are a German rock band from Hamburg. Formed in 1971 by producer and former music journalist Uwe Nettelbeck, the group was originally composed of Werner "Zappi" Diermaier (b.1949), Hans Joachim Irmler (b.1950), Arnulf Meifert, Jean-Hervé Péron (b.1949), Rudolf Sosna and Gunther Wüsthoff, working with engineer Kurt Graupner. Their work was oriented around dissonance, improvisation, and experimental electronic approaches, and would influence subsequent ambient and industrial music. They are considered a central act of West Germany's 1970s krautrock movement.
Madeline Charlotte Moorman was an American cellist, performance artist, and advocate for avant-garde music. Referred to as the "Jeanne d'Arc of new music", she was the founder of the Annual Avant Garde Festival of New York and a frequent collaborator with Korean American artist Nam June Paik.
Krautrock is a broad genre of experimental rock that developed in West Germany in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It originated among artists who blended elements of psychedelic rock, avant-garde composition, and electronic music, among other eclectic sources. Common elements included hypnotic rhythms, extended improvisation, musique concrète techniques, and early synthesizers, while the music generally moved away from the rhythm & blues roots and song structure found in traditional Anglo-American rock music. Prominent groups associated with the krautrock label included Neu!, Can, Faust, Tangerine Dream, Kraftwerk, Cluster, Ash Ra Tempel, Popol Vuh, Amon Düül II and Harmonia.
Experimental film or avant-garde cinema is a mode of filmmaking that rigorously re-evaluates cinematic conventions and explores non-narrative forms or alternatives to traditional narratives or methods of working. Many experimental films, particularly early ones, relate to arts in other disciplines: painting, dance, literature and poetry, or arise from research and development of new technical resources.
Nightingales are a British post-punk/alternative rock band, formed in 1979 in Birmingham, England, by four members of Birmingham's punk group The Prefects. They had been part of The Clash's 'White Riot Tour', recorded a couple of Peel Sessions, released a 45 on Rough Trade and, years after splitting up, had a retrospective CD released by US indie label Acute Records.
Italian futurist cinema was the oldest movement of European avant-garde cinema. Italian futurism, an artistic and social movement, impacted the Italian film industry from 1916 to 1919. It influenced Russian Futurist cinema and German Expressionist cinema. Its cultural importance was considerable and influenced all subsequent avant-gardes, as well as some authors of narrative cinema; its echo expands to the dreamlike visions of some films by Alfred Hitchcock.
Slapp Happy was a German/English avant-pop group, formed in Germany in 1972. Their lineup consisted of Anthony Moore (keyboards), Peter Blegvad (guitar) and Dagmar Krause (vocals). The band members moved to England in 1974 where they merged with Henry Cow, but the merger ended soon afterwards and Slapp Happy split up. Slapp Happy's sound was characterised by Dagmar Krause's unique vocal style. From 1982 there have been brief reunions to create an opera called Camera, record the album Ça Va in 1998, and perform shows around the world.
Isidore Isou, born Isidor Goldstein, was a Romanian-born French poet, dramaturge, novelist, film director, economist, and visual artist. He was the founder of Lettrism, an art and literary movement which owed inspiration to Dada and Surrealism.
Circle is a Finnish experimental rock band formed in Pori in 1991. Their eclectic, ever-changing style has been associated with genres such as krautrock, heavy metal, progressive rock, and ambient. On some albums they have defined themselves as New Wave of Finnish Heavy Metal (NWOFHM).
Permanent Fatal Error (PFE) is a project by Olivier Manchion, Ulan Bator founder member, and long time Faust collaborator. PFE first album is entitled Law Speed and was released in 2004 by Wallace Records, Klangbad -the label of Faust core member Hans-Joachim Irmler - and Ruminance. The musician defines this music as "deaf-blues". The project turns into solo or duo performances with Giulio Vetrone like the Pop Montreal festival in 2006, while Manchion joins again Ulan Bator and Faust in 2005 and 2006, touring also again with Damo Suzuki of Can (band) in France part of the "French Doctors" collective, and then disappears for years. In November 2014 Manchion announced the relaunch of the project and a new release entitled "Deaf sun / Deaf blues" on the Italian "microlabel" Secret furry hole.
Geoff Leigh is an English jazz and progressive rock musician, playing primarily soprano saxophone and flute. He was a member of the English avant-rock group Henry Cow and founded several bands himself, including Red Balune, Random Bob, Black Sheep, Mirage, and Ex-Wise Heads.
Ectogram were a Welsh band from Bangor, Wales.
Outside the Dream Syndicate is a 1973 album by United States avant-garde composer Tony Conrad in collaboration with German krautrock group Faust. The album marks Conrad's first and only musical release for many years, and remains his best known musical work. It is considered a classic of minimalist and drone music. Pitchfork exclaims "for a moment in Outside the Dream Syndicate, one forgets what exactly is moving and what is standing still."
Mary Ocher ("Oh-chur") is a recording artist, performer, poet, director and visual artist.
Betzy Bromberg is an American director, editor, and experimental filmmaker. She was the Director of the Program in Film and Video at California Institute of the Arts, and remains in the position of full time Faculty. Her work has been shown at the Rotterdam, London, Edinburgh, Sundance and Vancouver Film Festivals as well as the Museum of Modern Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the San Francisco Cinematheque, the Harvard Film Archive (Cambridge), Anthology Film Archives, the National Film Theater (London), The Vootrum Centrum (Belgium) and the Centre Georges Pompidou (France).
Parking Non-Stop is a north Wales based psychogeographical musical/artistic collective who experiment in combining soundscape and field recordings with spoken word and music. The group consist of the poet Zoë Skoulding and musicians Alan Holmes and Dewi Evans, often in collaboration with additional musicians and artists.
Glassglue is a British experimental pop group, formed in London in 2003, by German singer, Marcel Stoetzler, and British multi-instrumentalist, Matthew Karas. After writing and arranging some material and performing as a duo, they recruited Andrea Ughetto to play bass and Ravi Low-Beer to play drums. Andrea, who was involved as a favour to Marcel, was replaced by Gianluca Galetti in 2004. Ravi Low-Beer was replaced by Emyr Tomos in 2005, but returned to the group in 2009.
Katherine Araniello was a London-based live art, performance and video artist, who responded to the negative representation of disability. She used a range of mediums including film, large scale production and live art performances. Araniello was a member of The Disabled Avant-Garde (DAG) with deaf artist Aaron Williamson.
