Los Angeles artists Yann Novak, Robert Crouch and Ian Wellman return home from their west coast tour and are joined by Byron Westbrook. Yann Novak will present his new work Slowly Dismantling which reflecting on his formative experiences as a queer youth in middle America and explores these acoustic and social spaces as zones of liberation. Byron Westbrook will present the LA premiere of a new series of compositions for electronics using just intonation and custom tuning systems. Robert Crouch will perform new work inspired by poet Ted Berrigan, that explores the tensions between collective listening and personal reflection. Ian Wellman will be performing segments from his latest offering, Bioaccumulation, and new material comprised of recordings made around Southern California, Sierra Nevada, and Lake Azeui, Haiti.

Yann Novak is a queer interdisciplinary artist and composer based in Los Angeles. His work is guided by his interests in perception, context, movement, and the felt presence of direct experience. Through the use of sound and light, Novak explores how these intangible materials can act as catalysts to focus our awareness on our present location in space and time. Novak’s diverse body of works—audiovisual installations, performances, recording, and prints—ask participants to reclaim the present moment as a political act. His work has been experienced through exhibitions and performance at AB Salon, Brussels; Armory Center for the Arts, Pasadena, California; The Broad, Los Angeles; Commonwealth & Council, Los Angeles; Danspace, New York; de Young Museum, San Francisco; Fylkingen, Stockholm; The Getty Villa, Pacific Palisades, California; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; The Henry Art Gallery, Seattle; Human Resources, Los Angeles; Iklectik, London; Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane; LACMA, Los Angeles; Mutek Festival, Montreal; Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena, California; SFMoMA, San Francisco; Soundfjord, London; and The Stone, New York, among others.His works have been released by 901 Editions, Dragon’s Eye Recordings, LINE, Room40, and Touch, among others.
https://www.yannnovak.com

Byron Westbrook is an artist and musician based in Los Angeles, CA. He has been performing and showing experimental sound work internationally since 2008. His work focuses on dynamics of perception using sound, lighting and video to interact with architecture and landscape, often pursuing routes that involve social engagement. He holds an MFA from the Bard College, where he studied with Marina Rosenfeld, Marcus Schmickler and David Behrman. His work has been presented at Walker Art Center (Minneapolis), ICA London, Cafe OTO (London), MoMA PS1, Fridman Gallery, Abrons Arts Center, Pioneer Works, Experimental Intermedia Foundation (NY), MaerzMusik Festival (Berlin), Human Resources (Los Angeles), Disjecta (Portland, OR), Instants Chavires Art Space (Paris), Fylkingen (Stockholm), the LAB (San Francisco), O’ (Milan), Suoni Popolo, Akousma Festival (Montreal) among many others. He has recordings with Root Strata, Umor Rex, Hands in the Dark and Sedimental Records. Westbrook has been in residence at Civitella Ranieri Foundation, Banff Centre for the Arts, ISSUE Project Room, Clocktower Gallery, Diapason Gallery, Wassaic Project and EMS Stockholm. He is currently Visiting Faculty with Pratt Institute Fine Arts Dept and International Center of Photography.
https://www.byronwestbrook.com

Robert Crouch is an artist and curator whose work encompasses sound, performance, and technology. As an artist, he locates his work with the intersection of post-phenomenological listening practices, conceptual sound art, and contemporary electronic music. At its core, his work can be understood as a conversation between tonality, context, history and subjectivities. Similarly, Crouch’s curatorial work focuses on the overlapping disciplines of sound, technology, movement, and performance. Crouch is currently the Executive and Artistic Director for Fulcrum Arts and the Artistic Director for the A×S Festival. His works have been published by Dragon’s Eye Recordings, LINE, and Touch, among others.
https://www.robertcrouch.com

Taking influence from ethnographic film, bioacoustics, and noise music, Ian Wellman merges real and imagined worlds to create consuming acoustic portraits. His work is created from single tape loops, effect pedals, and field recordings, often focusing on themes based on the environmental collapse. Wellman’s solo efforts have been released on Room 40, Dragon’s Eye Recordings, Touch Radio, and Industrial Coast. Along with Aaron Bartell, he is part of the collaborative listening duo Zzyzxzyzz, which focuses on electromagnetic and other inaudible by ear sound worlds. Ian is an IATSE 695 production sound mixer for film/video by trade. Ian Wellman works and resides in Los Angeles, CA.
https://ianwellman.com