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Close To There/Gather: Edbrass Brasil // Rob Frye // Kim Alpert

A brazilian sound artist and improviser, Edbrass Brasil works in several creative areas, notably as a radio artist, festival organizer and label manager.

In his solo presentations or in small groups, he uses non-conventional wind instruments, along with extended techniques, sound collage and texture overlays, exploring in a microtonal environment the drone-immersive climate, with references to the Brazilian Afro-Diasporic universe .

He presented in severall places in Brazil and Latin America, as Festival Aural (México), Festival Novas Frequências (Brasil) and  Every Time A Ear di Soun as part of documenta 14 (Kassel).

https://edbrass.webnode.com

https://edbmusic1.bandcamp.com/album/a-cidade-que-n-o-dorme-ep

A resident of Chicago since 2006, Rob Frye is a midwestern multi-instrumentalist practicing woodwinds, guitar, synthesizer, casio samplers and bike tires.  In 2010 he created Flux Bikes, a project that travels on two wheels in the US and abroad, amplifying his bike tire beats through a custom-built solar powered sound system. Rob spent three summers conducting bird surveys for the Institute for Bird Populations in the Sierra Nevada mountains and is in his fourth summer working as a Resident Artist for the Inferno Mobile Recording Studio in the Chicago Park District. From the Hideout: "A constant collaborator, Rob is able to give a unique voice in a variety of different kinds of ensembles..."

Kim Alpert believes in human-centric design and integrating technology with strategy in her time-based projects. With a background in fine art, music, and carpentry Kim brings an attention to detail and diverse styles to both her art and commercial work.

Kim holds a degree in Digital Art & Design from Full Sail University and was inducted into their hall of fame in 2013. She has shown art at places like Stony Island Arts Bank, SOFA Expo, The Modern Wing at the Art Institute of Chicago and Facets Cinematheque. She has an interactive room to visualize and create sound as part of the permanent collection at the National Music Center/Studio Bell in Canada. Kim tours internationally with performance projects building digital and analog video systems. Her performance practice include works with Mike Reed, Rob Mazurek, Matthew Lux, The Instigation Orchestra and a host of other artists.

Kim currently runs her studio Make Amazing Inc. in Chicago, IL USA. She is an outspoken advocate for social change through technology, meditation and bananas.

Gather is an experimental music series bringing musicians from different scenes, backgrounds, practices, disciplines, and communities together for connection and artistic exchange. We curate this series with our attention toward introducing musicians who may not otherwise cross paths and whose works dialogue in compelling ways. By doing so, we hope to leave potential for collaboration and familiarity amongst different experimental music forms in Chicago. Gather is curated by Allen Moore, Nick Meryhew, and Rebecca Himelstein


Close to There < > Perto de Lá is an international artist exchange project between Comfort Station (Chicago, USA) and Projeto Ativa (Salvador, Brazil), in collaboration with Harmonipan (Mexico City, Salvador), made possible by the MacArthur Foundation International Connections Fund. By bringing members of these two artistic communities in proximity with one another, this project aims to gestate long-term artistic collaborations between the participants, share arts-organizing models from their respective socio-political-artistic contexts, and encourage creative discourse around ideas such as the African Diaspora and contemporary Latinx/Latin American identities.

The exchange will begin with a multi-disciplinary group of Salvador-based artists visiting Chicago August 9th - 29th 2019, carrying out a variety of programs, performances, and research through Comfort Station and its partner spaces across the city. In February of 2020, a group of Chicago-based artists will in turn visit Salvador to engage with the city’s creative landscape via Projeto Ativa’s network of artists and cultural institutions.

Our institutional partner venues in Chicago include:

The Poetry Foundation
Links Hall
Rebuild Foundation (Stony Island Arts Bank, Dorchester Art + Housing Project)
Spudnik Press
Co Prosperity Sphere
6018 North
Arts Incubator (
University of Chicago’s Arts + Public Life initiative)

This project is made possible by the generosity of the MacArthur Foundation’s International Connections Fund.

Organized and curated by Jordan Martins, Lanussi Pasquali, and Juci Reis.
Graphic Design by Paco Barba