Noise Night [Glitch Art is Dead]

To celebrate the close of the [Glitch Art is Dead: Minneapolis] exhibition and event series, Gamut Gallery welcomed Alex Kmett of Zombie Bite to curate a night of live A/V performances in the gallery. Noise Night featured influential makers in the local noise music scene including Albert Elmore, Seth Van Horn, and John Vance performing their latest solo projects PD, Black Lotus, and Trigger Alert. Fresh off a West Coast tour, local power electronics act Gnawed took the stage, as well as touring band Frightened Moon (Chicago), and VJ Steve Killingbeck.

Noise music shares the same spirit and philosophy of glitch art. Both use various analog and digital data manipulation techniques to intentionally corrupt files, generate chaos and innovate new ways to explore visuals and sound. Inherently experimental and often more esoteric than musical, these musicians escape traditional sonic confines in favor of exploration using electronic samplers, synths, guitar pedals, heavy processing, reverb, microphones and feedback. Lots of feedback.

The “Glitch Art is Dead: Minneapolis” exhibition was a collection of glitch works from over 80 artists that represented a total of 23 countries. Over 300 individuals from across the world submitted in excess of 2,000 works to the open call. Co-curators and organizers Miles Taylor (Minneapolis), Aleksandra Pieńkosz (Kraków), and Zoe Stawska (Warsaw) distinguished stylistic subgenres, dividing the selected works by technique to highlight the variety of mediums, inspirations, and conceptions found within the glitch art community.

Although glitch art’s roots go back to the 20th century, it is a nascent artistic movement with a far-flung, but significantly-sized, community centered around the Glitch Artists Collective with a Facebook following of over 52,000 people. An international artistic project which started in Kraków, Poland in 2015, Glitch Art is Dead kicked off at Teatr Barakah with an exhibit of 30 artists and a day of workshops. It is the initiative’s goal to foster a deep sense of community by bringing these digital denizens into the real world. The Glitch Art is Dead: Minneapolis exhibition aimed to further deny its title, introducing the viewer to a wide spectrum of artwork that showcased the vitality of the practice.