Exquisite corpse is a surrealist method of collectively creating a text whereby each collaborator adds to the composition by only seeing and responding to what the previous person had written…. In the short, experimental attempt at thinking together , interdisciplinary artist Nolan Oswald Dennis and writer Zoé Samudzi collectively approach what Dennis has termed “a Black consciousness of space” in his artistic practice…

E. Jane’s first solo institutional exhibition Where there’s love overflowing is on view at The Kitchen through May 14, 2022. While the artist was installing their work at The Kitchen, Curatorial Intern Alexis Jacquet spoke them about the intersection of art and music, and the research behind the new pieces created for this exhibition. In the conversation below, they get into the legacy of Black femmes in the music industry, how history informs the work of music covers, the realities of working as both visual and performing artist, and the power of love…

stefa marin alarcon was in residence through The Kitchen at Queenslab from May 17–23, 2021. The work that they created during their residency, Born With An Extra Rib: The Film, will premiere at The Kitchen on March 17, 2022. After alarcon’s residency, Curatorial Intern Maryam Rahaman spoke with the artist about their work and process...

Annie-B Parson is the co-founder and Artistic Director of Big Dance Theater, a company known for merging dance, theater, music, and visual design that celebrated its 30th anniversary in 2021. Parson's work focuses on choreographing momentary realms—using a variety of elements such as “mood, tonality, and color” to engage the audience while releasing the need for linear structure….

In December 2021, The Kitchen welcomed back Claire Chase to perform a new program of flute works, Density 2036, part viii. Celebrating its eighth year, Density 2036 is Chase’s ongoing project to commission modern flute compositions annually until the centennial of Edgard Varèse’s 1936 flute solo, Density 21.5. Motivated by Varèse’s work, Chase commissioned composers Ann Cleare, Matana Roberts, and Wang Lu to help her break new ground in this year’s program…

Kenneth Tam has been artistically invested in men’s social spaces for years, exposing themes that have floated unnamed through national conversations. His work follows men’s behavior and points out the patterns that exist at the intersections of race and social intimacy. Tam’s projects engage with the reality that America’s masculinity crisis is ongoing, and Asian American men are not exempt…

On April 16th – 18th, 2021, Efraín Rozas presented Still, the culmination of his residency hosted by The Kitchen at Queenslab. Rozas is a Peruvian artist—equal parts composer, performer, and software developer—who works on ideas of body, mind, and technology. Extending and stretching these ideas, the sound installation Still interrogates the structures of time…

Shaun Irons and Lauren Petty are interdisciplinary artists who work collaboratively on projects that range from installations and performances to experimental films and interactive video scores. Their collaboration also extends in some cases into their efforts as teaching artists: for instance, Irons and Petty have contributed jointly to The Kitchen’s education programs at Liberty High School Academy for Newcomers for roughly ten years…

Density 2036 is a twenty-four-year project begun by Claire Chase in 2013 to commission an entirely new body of repertory for solo flute each year until the 100th Anniversary of Edgard Varèse’s groundbreaking 1936 flute solo, Density 21.5. For Density 2036: part vii, Chase commissioned Australian composer Liza Lim to create new work…

Baseera Khan was in residence through The Kitchen at Queenslab from September 11–October 11, 2020, working on producing a pilot for their television show, By Faith. On October 8, Khan, Curator Lumi Tan, Director/Producer Ethan Weinstock, and Cinematographer Chris Wairegi were in conversation for a virtual wrap party…

Autumn Knight’s residency in The Kitchen’s building at 512 West 19th Street is an example of an artist interacting with the realm of the unknown—a realm that has become far too familiar with the unpredictable changes that the pandemic and uprisings have caused…

Ka Baird and Max Eilbacher—two innovative and celebrated musicians, producers, and performers—are teaming up in an exciting collaboration for The Kitchen titled Vivification Exercises. Each of their extensive bodies of work balance playful experimentation with a sense of deep introspection that invites listeners into a world both engaging and disorienting…

Muyassar Kurdi is an interdisciplinary artist who works across film, movement, sound, and performance. Her record Voice Games, recorded in collaboration with Ka Baird, was released on Astral Spirits on February 28. This spring, The Kitchen has been working with Muyassar to develop a workshop for MoMA PS1’s Come Together (Apart) festival…

Since 2010, Felix Bernstein and Gabe Rubin have been working collaboratively on live performances, film projects, and multimedia exhibitions. Their multifaceted production is primarily informed by drag performance, queer theory, greek mythology/tragedy, and social media…

Richard Maxwell is a playwright and theater director best known for his work with the New York City Players, a company he founded in 1999. Utilizing sparse sets and often laconic acting styles, Maxwell reduces theater to its most essential elements, creating plays that, in the words of critic Hilton Als, oscillate between the “mythic” and the “mundane.” …

Lauren Bakst is a New York City-based artist and writer working through performance. Her work draws from the materials and relationships of her life to contend with the conditions of intimacy, desire, and affect. She has been in residence…

In 2017, Brooklyn-raised multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and tape manipulator Taja Cheek used the moniker L’Rain to release her first eponymous album on Astro Nautico Records. Though this project was dedicated in name and spirit to Cheek’s mother Lorraine,…

Born in Kansas City, Young was trained in both jazz and classical clarinet and began his professional music career in San Francisco in the 1960s as a radio DJ and performer. While in San Francisco, Young recorded albums both with the improvisation ensemble Infinite Sound and as a solo act. Young moved to New York in 1979 and…

Mario Diaz de Leon is a NYC-based composer, multi-instrumentalist, performer, and educator whose work encompasses modern classical, experimental electronic, extreme metal, and creative improvised music. Cycle and Reveal, released in September on Denovali, is his fourth full-length modern classical LP. …

For five weeks from today through the end of October, artist James Allister Sprang is in residence in The Kitchen’s first-floor space, developing a new iteration of his ongoing project Turning Towards a Radical Listening. Sprang will begin his residency by organizing a sound-based sculptural installation, which will become a stage for public conversations with poets…

Angie Pittman is a Bessie award-winning dance artist, maker, and educator whose work investigates how her body moves through ballad, groove, sparkle, spirit, spirituals, ancestry, vulnerability, and power. A longtime Kitchen friend, Pittman returns to our space June 29 to perform in the final weekend of ASSEMBLY…

Lafawndah is a pop artist whose influences, approaches, and ideologies intentionally and self-proclaimedly defy categorizations of geography and genre. Her first full-length album, ANCESTOR BOY, came out earlier this year. In anticipation of Lafawndah’s June 29 performance at The Kitchen as part of the ASSEMBLY series,…

On April 5 and 6, 2019, Stacy Grossfield presented metamorphosis at The Kitchen as part of Dance and Process. I sat down with Stacy Grossfield, along with performers and collaborators Nola Sporn Smith and Alexandra Albrecht to learn more about their experiences, process, and work.

Musician, composer, and producer Rafiq Bhatia defies any one genre or category. After moving to New York in 2010 post graduating from Oberlin College & Conservatory, Bhatia released a succession of highly-praised, improvisation-driven albums challenging traditional jazz, electronic, and hip-hop composition. From here,…

Japanese born, New York-based artist, Miho Hatori reimagines identity in her show Salon Mondialité at The Kitchen, March 22–23. Lyrical songs and improvised ambient sounds intersect in the form of an experimental TV talk show, accompanied by musicians Smokey Hormel, Patrick Higgins, and Melvin “Grave” Guzman. Hatori calls forward…

Pamela Z, legendary electronic musician and performer, is one of the commissioned composers for the upcoming performance: Claire Chase: Density 2036, part vi premiering at The Kitchen March 1-2, 2019. I spoke with her to learn more about her process of coming up with a piece, her experience working with Claire Chase for the first time, and what she is up to next.

Tina Satter is an experimental playwright and director based in New York City. In 2008, she founded the Brooklyn-based ensemble Half Straddle; a group of performers and designers that make plays, performances, video, and music via her writing and direction. Since then, Half Straddle has premiered nine full-length shows,…

Artist Jibade-Khalil Huffman has been working in, around, and between the worlds of video and literature for much of his adult life. As a child, however, all he wanted was to be a DJ. And the significance of this childhood fantasy becomes abundantly clear when one speaks with Huffman regarding his show, Tempo, on view at The Kitchen through this Saturday, December 15. With twenty years of perspective,…

Leila Bordreuil is a composer and cellist whose current work is based in noise music and improvisation. In 2012, Bordreuil received her BA in Electronic Music and Electronic Arts from Bard College, where she studied with Marina Rosenfeld and Richard Teitelbaum. Bordreuil has previously performed at The Kitchen with Eli Keszler. She now returns to present her own composition, Piece for Cello and Double Bass Ensemble II, the debut of…

In a one-night performance at The Kitchen, Volumes for Sound, Voice, experimental vocalists and performers Tatyana Tenenbaum and Odeya Nini will collaborate in improvisational interaction with Melissa Dubbin and Aaron S. Davidson’s acoustic sculptures Volumes for Sound. We speak with the artists ahead of the performance…