MEDIA CONTACT
JOANNA SZU
858.822.3199
jszu@ucsd.edu
October at ArtPower at UC San Diego
Featuring Bang on a Can All-Stars, Huang Yi, Greg Wohead,
Los Hámsters, La Santa Cecilia, and Alfredo Rodriguez Trio
La Jolla, C.A.—ArtPower at UC San Diego presents six events covering six series during October. The month opens with a collaboration with La Jolla Playhouse’s Without Walls Festival from October 9–11, presenting the west coast premiere of Greg Wohead’s The Nearness of You—featuring Hurtling and The Backseat of My Car (and other safe places). Also on October 9, the first Foovie [Food + Movie] event of the season features filmmaker Gilberto González Pensilla’s debut feature film, Los Hámsters, to celebrate the National Hispanic Heritage month. On October 14, award-winning Taiwanese choreographer Huang Yi makes his San Diego debut with his robot KUKA in the ground-breaking work HUANG YI & KUKA. GRAMMY Award–winning band La Santa Cecilia will perform from their most recent album Someday New, on October 22. On October 23, The Loft at UC San Diego will host Cuban jazz pianist Alfredo Rodriguez and his trio. Rounding out October is the U.S. airport premiere of Brian Eno’s Music for Airports performed by Bang on a Can All-Stars, on Tuesday October 27 at 7:30 and 9 pm, at the San Diego International Airport. Tickets for events start at $10 and can be ordered online at boxoffice.ucsd.edu or by calling the box office at 858.534.TIXS (8497). Additional program information can be found at artpower.ucsd.edu.
Greg Wohead
The Nearness of You
Friday––Sunday, October 9–11
Hurtling: 11:30 am – 6 pm, Fallen Star, Stuart Collection
Backseat of My Car (and other safe places): 7:30–10 pm, Parking Lot 102
Tickets: $10
Greg Wohead is a writer, performer, and live artist who creates theater shows, one-to-one performances, and audio pieces. Hurtling and The Backseat of My Car (and other safe places) together form The Nearness of You, a pair of performances dealing with ideas of closeness (physically and temporally), the sensation of driving, autobiography, and the experience of time. Hurtling is an invitation to remember a previous version of yourself, to imagine a future version, and to wonder who that makes you now. It starts with a true story—your true story. An outdoor performance for one with a cassette player and headphones that’s remade for each location in which it’s performed, Hurtling is a glimpse of a fleeting moment as it zooms past; an attempt to grasp at a slippery present. The Backseat of My Car (and other safe places) is an interactive true storytelling piece for one audience member at a time that takes place somewhere off by ourselves. It’s about being a teenager and those moments when you’re on the verge of something exciting. Presented as part of the 2015 La Jolla Playhouse’s Without Walls Festival, Wohead’s truly intimate work will bring audience and performer into genuine emotional and physical closeness.
Los Hámsters
National Hispanic Heritage Month
Friday, October 9, Food 7 pm; Movie 8 pm, The Loft
Tickets: $34 Food + Movie; $10 Movie Only
Los Hámsters is a delightfully dark social satire about a riotously dysfunctional Tijuana family. The parents and two teenagers are going to such lengths to hide secrets from each other that they are completely oblivious to the drama in the others lives. Emerging Mexican filmmaker Gil González has crafted a comedy that packs a lot of punch through subtly drawn family dynamics reflecting contemporary middle class society worldwide.
Huang Yi & KUKA
Wednesday, October 14, 8 pm, Mandeville Auditorium
Tickets: $28–46
Taiwanese dancer, choreographer, inventor, and videographer Huang Yi’s pioneering work is steeped in his fascination with the partnership between humans and robots. He interweaves continuous movement with mechanical and multimedia elements to create dance which corresponds with the flow of data, effectively making the performer a dancing instrument. Named by Dance Magazine as one of the “25 to Watch,” Huang was immersed in the arts at a young age, spending much of his childhood in his parents’ studio watching them teach tango and learning to paint alongside his father. He is widely considered one of Asia’s most prolific choreographers. Huang’s groundbreaking and award-winning work, Huang Yi & KUKA, in which he performs alongside a robot he conceptualized and programmed, opened the 2013 Ars Electronica Festival (Austria), the internationally renowned unique platform for digital art and media culture.
La Santa Cecilia
Thursday, October 22, 8 pm, Price Center West Ballroom
Tickets: $30
La Santa Cecilia exemplifies the modern-day creative hybrid of Latin culture, rock, and world music. The band draws inspiration from all over the world, utilizing Pan-American rhythms like cumbia, bossa nova, rumba, bolero, tango, jazz, rock, and klezmer music. Their unique sound and the experience of their colorful, passionate performance leave fans and new listeners mesmerized. In 2013, the band released their major label debut Treinta Dias (30 Days), which featured a captivating collaboration with fan Elvis Costello on “Losing Game.” After their 2014 Grammy win for Best Latin Rock, Urban, or Alternative Album, the band presented their most recent album Someday New, including a heartfelt Spanglish rendition of The Beatles iconic “Strawberry Fields Forever,” plus the unforgettable new Mexican classic “Como Dios Manda.” Known as “the voice of immigrants” to many fans, these proud Los Angelenos are a powerful band with a trans-border message.
Alfredo Rodriguez Trio
Friday, October 23, 8 pm, The Loft
Tickets: $18 General Admission; $28 Reserved
At the forefront of a new generation of Cuban pianists, 26 years old Alfredo Rodriguez possesses a sublime and soulful virtuosity. Born in Havana to a popular singer and television personality of the same name, the young Alfredo began classical piano studies at age 10. As a teen, he appeared on his father’s show with many of Cuba’s greatest musicians and simultaneously played in street bands while studying at the prestigious Instituto Superior de Arte. A fateful invitation to perform at the Montreaux Jazz Festival in 2006 brought the pianist to the attention of Quincy Jones, who produced Rodriguez’s debut album, Sounds of Space. Rodriguez made his American debut at the Playboy Jazz Festival opening for Wayne Shorter, and his career has been on a rocket ride ever since. He will bring his new trio, who will blow the roof off The Loft in support of their Quincy Jones–produced Mack Avenue album, The Invasion Parade, a thrilling exploration of contemporary and Latin jazz.
Bang on a Can All-Stars
Tuesday, October 27, 2015, 7:30 pm and 9 pm, San Diego International Airport
Tickets: $40
Bang on a Can All-Stars offers its landmark live performance of Brian Eno’s ambient classic Music for Airports. In 1978 Eno redefined how we relate to music in our everyday lives with this mesmerizing, dreamy, intense sonic landscape. In his analog studio, looping bits of tape, he never imagined that a new generation of musicians would take his music out of the studio and perform it live. New York’s electric chamber ensemble Bang on a Can All-Stars brings this masterpiece to life. Since their celebrated 1998 recording of Brian Eno: Music for Airports, Bang on a Can All-Stars have brought this work to live audiences across the globe with concerts at many of the most prestigious festivals and venues including Lincoln Center, Royal Festival Hall in London, the Sydney Opera House, and even public performances at Brussels International Airport, Schipol Airport in Holland, and John Lennon Airport in Liverpool. This will be the very exciting premiere of the work in an airport on U.S. soil, at our very own San Diego International Airport!
About ArtPower
ArtPower at UC San Diego builds creative experiences in music, dance, film, exhibition, and food for our collective pleasure and inspiration. We engage diverse audiences through vibrant, challenging, multi-disciplinary performances by emerging and renowned international artists. Through extensive partnerships, ArtPower provides exciting opportunities for research, participation, and creation of new work, igniting powerful dialogue between artists, students, scholars, and the community.
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