Maria Chavez is an

improviser Improvisation is the activity of making or doing something not planned beforehand, using whatever can be found. Improvisation in the performing arts is a very spontaneous performance without specific or scripted preparation. The skills of impr ...

curator A curator (from la, cura, meaning "to take care") is a manager or overseer. When working with cultural organizations, a curator is typically a "collections curator" or an "exhibitions curator", and has multifaceted tasks dependent on the parti ...

and

sound artist Sound art is an artistic activity in which sound is utilized as a primary medium or material. Like many genres of contemporary art, sound art may be interdisciplinary in nature, or be used in hybrid forms. According to Brandon LaBelle, sound art ...

from

Lima Lima ( ; ), originally founded as Ciudad de Los Reyes (City of The Kings) is the capital and the largest city of Peru. It is located in the valleys of the Chillón, Rímac and Lurín Rivers, in the desert zone of the central coastal part of ...

Peru , image_flag = Flag of Peru.svg , image_coat = Escudo nacional del Perú.svg , other_symbol = Great Seal of the State , other_symbol_type = National seal , national_motto = "Firm and Happy f ...

. Her sound installations, visual objects and live

turntable A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910) or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogu ...

performances focus on the values of the accident and its unique, complicated possibilities with sound emitting machinery like the turntable. Influenced by improvisation in

contemporary art Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic co ...

, her work expands outside of the sound world straddling different disciplines of interest. The sound installations and live turntable performances of Maria Chavez focus on the paradox of time and the present moment, with many influences stemming from improvisation in contemporary art.

Awards

She was awarded the Jerome Foundation’s Emerging Artist Grant by

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

’s

Roulette Intermedium Roulette Intermedium is a performing arts and new music venue located in Brooklyn, New York City. Founded in 1978, it has been located in the neighborhoods of Tribeca and SoHo in Manhattan, and now resides in a renovated theater in downtown Brookly ...

in 2008, and in 2009 she became a recipient of the Van Lier Fellowship by The Edward and Sally Van Lier Fund of the

New York Community Trust The New York Community Trust is the community foundation for New York City, with divisions in Westchester and Long Island. It is one of the oldest and largest community foundations in the United States and one of the largest funders of New York C ...

Work

For her experimental turntablism, Chavez uses new and broken needles (the latter of which she refers to as 'perfect to ruin' needles), on a collection of vinyl she uses to build a sound palette. Chavez's compositions are created for specific locations, and their acoustic characteristics allow for the ambiguity of reverberation, reflection, and refraction to enter into each composition. Maria was an artist in residence with the

Merce Cunningham Mercier Philip "Merce" Cunningham (April 16, 1919 – July 26, 2009) was an American dancer and choreographer who was at the forefront of American modern dance for more than 50 years. He frequently collaborated with artists of other discipl ...

Dance Company, the Clocktower and the Dia:Beacon Museum. Chavez has also been an artist in residence at Issue Project Room, and played in

Christian Marclay Christian Marclay (born January 11, 1955) is a visual artist and composer. He holds both American and Swiss nationality. Marclay's work explores connections between sound, noise, photography, video, and film. A pioneer of using gramophone records ...

's Screenplay at the

Whitney Museum The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is an art museum in the Meatpacking District and West Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1930 by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1875–194 ...

in 2010. In 2012, Chavez published her first book ''Of Technique: Chance Procedures on Turntable'', which she wrote and illustrated herself. The book serves as a how-to manual for those interested in learning the abstract turntablism techniques that she developed with the turntable. This book is considered the first sound related release by Chavez since her

solo album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early 20th century as individual 78 rpm records co ...

release in 2004. In 2019 the Macro label released an album by Chavez based on treatments of the empty locked grooves of a vinyl record by Stefan Goldmann.

Collaborations

She has worked with

and the Whitney Museum of American Art in NYC as part of Christian Marclay: FESTIVAL, has shared the stage with renowned artists such as

Pauline Oliveros Pauline Oliveros (May 30, 1932 – November 24, 2016) was an American composer, accordionist and a central figure in the development of post-war experimental and electronic music. She was a founding member of the San Francisco Tape Music Cente ...

Thurston Moore Thurston Joseph Moore (born July 25, 1958) is an American musician best known as a member of Sonic Youth. He has also participated in many solo and group collaborations outside Sonic Youth, as well as running the Ecstatic Peace! record label. Mo ...

Phill Niblock Phill Niblock (born October 2, 1933 in Anderson, Indiana) is an American composer, filmmaker, videographer, and director of Experimental Intermedia,Alan Licht, ''Common Tones: Selected Interviews with Artists and Musicians 1995-2020'', Blank Forms ...

and

Otomo Yoshihide is a Japanese composer and multi-instrumentalist. He mainly plays guitar, turntables, and electronics. He first came to international prominence in the 1990s as the leader of the experimental rock group Ground Zero, and has since worked i ...

, and has toured with Christina Carter. She has also collaborated with fellow turntablists

, dieb13, and eRikm as part of the Wien Modern festival of contemporary music in

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chavez, Maria Living people Sound artists Women sound artists People from Lima Women in electronic music Year of birth missing (living people)