TANGENT TANGENT
JANUARY 4-11, 2024
MAGMA GALLERY, ROME
Tangent: a straight line or plane that touches a curve or curved surface at a point, but if extended does not cross it at that point — or — a completely different line of thought or action.
Events & Workshops
Listed times are local to Rome (CET) Exhibition on view: January, 4-11 2024
MAGMA, Via Galeazzo Alessi, 212, 00176 Rome
Visiting hours: by appointment and during in-person events
In-Person Event
JAN. 4, Thursday, 7:30PMTangent Opening Reception
€5 entrance
In-Person Workshop
JAN. 5, Friday, 11AM-1P,3-5PM Collaborative Indeterminacy: co-writing a live improvisation for chaotic instruments (Day 1)
Led by Massimiliano Cerioni at Magma
How do we make sense out of chaos? Can controlled randomness be expressive? How do we keep consistent when writing and performing something improvised with another artist?
By implementing and combining chaotic systems in Max 8, the students will work together to write collaborative scores, facing the challenge of the indeterminacy coming from these tools and the inherent lack of total control that collaborative projects imply.
- To apply, send resume to massimiliano.cerioni@gmail.com
(limited to 8 participants)
- Required skills: basic Max patching, basic DSP, editing in Ableton Live, confidence with XX-XXI music languages
- Required tools: Max 8 (licensed/demo), Ableton Live 11 (licensed/demo), Google Drive account, Laptop (Mac/PC), stereo output soundcard
- Useful Tools: MIDI/USB Controllers, Instruments you can connect to your equipment without requiring any extra tech
- €90 participation fee for 5 sessions of 2 hours each plus final presentation
In-Person Workshop
JAN. 8, Monday, 11AM-1PM,3-5PMCollaborative Indeterminacy (Day 2)
Led by Massimiliano Cerioni at Magma
Online Event
JAN. 8, Monday, 3-4:30PMCollective Conversations: 10-minute Virtual Artist Presentations
With James Barkley, Sarah Cadigan-Fried, Padmini Chandrasekaran, Joshua Duttweiler, Christopher Field, Lavaughan Jenkins, and Vaishnavi Kumar
Zoom Recording
Online Workshop
JAN. 9, Tuesday, 5-7PMTangible: Virtual Connections to Physical Space
Led by James Barkley, Sarah Cadigan-Fried, Padmini Chandrasekaran, Joshua Duttweiler, Christopher Field, and Lavaughan Jenkins
In reaction to conceptual geometric prompts, participants are invited to create posters that reimagine the relationships and connections between visual elements of the exhibition and other found materials. The workshop will take place via Zoom and Miro; creative and curious people based anywhere in the world are invited to attend. The resulting posters will be printed and displayed at Magma in Rome.
Register Here
- Free; optional €5/$5 donation towards Magma + on-site printing/installation.
- All skill levels welcome
Zoom Recording
Miro Link
In-Person Workshop
JAN. 10, Wednesday, 11AM–5PM* Archiving Place: Collection, Character, and Collaboration
Led by Kristen Mallia and Molly Haig at Magma
*With a 1-hour break from 2-3pm
This workshop draws inspiration from the language and textures of our surroundings: graffiti, signage, painted surfaces, handwritten notes, and overlooked curiosities of the city. Participants will collect and photograph materials of interest, then explore the possibilities of digital manipulation, physical deconstruction, and multimedia embellishments. Collective designs from our session will be printed and distributed to participants and visitors at the closing reception.
Register Here
- All skill levels welcome.
- Please bring a phone or camera for photos.
- Optional: laptop/design tool of choice.
- €30 participation & printing fee
In-Person Event
Closing Reception with Live Performances JAN. 11, Thursday
€5 entrance
7-8PM, Sound Workshop Showcase
8:30PM, Sound Performances
By Massimiliano Cerioni and Michele Papa
Donations and fees will help support Magma’s cultural mission.
ON VIEW ON VIEW
James Barkley
Untangled, New York City
Analogue photography, 2023
This project is informed by the tangent line points on the tangled and curved nyc subway map lines. The exact location aboveground to a tangent line point is the resulting photograph, giving an alternative visual context to the regular map.
The process of documenting these points has felt like an untangling of the chaos and complexity of the city.
Sarah Cadigan-Fried
Seven Veils
Ribbed Lace and Wedding Mesh, 2023
In the last few years, every aspect of my life has changed so many times over that it has created an uncomfortable disconnect between me and myself. There are changes that happen in big moments, both expected and unexpected. And there are small moments that we fail to notice change us, too. Everyday, we are new. My intention with this work is to confront the juxtaposition of new-ness and identity —a friction that I find particularly interesting as a woman in a world that commodifies women.
Massimiliano Cerioni and Molly Haig
Inverted Duet
A Piece in Four Movements for Paper and Code, 2023
Inverted Duet involves parallel responses to a shared language-based score consisting of four four-part movements. Each part includes a material, an action, and a description extracted from the Tangent Wikipedia page, and each movement is interpreted forwards by one artist and backwards by the other.
Within a shared structure, connections and divergences between two minds and two distinct approaches are revealed.
Padmini Chandrasekaran
Family Touch
Digital prints, 2023
As a mother of a one year old, there are many things I’m still adjusting to. Never having enough time to dedicate to my creative practice, a whole new family dynamic, and being touched constantly. As I sat at my computer, thinking of all the things I needed to get done while my daughter napped, I thought it might be interesting to note down all the things I touched within that hour. It became a strange balance between going forward with intended, touch-necessary actions, becoming acutely aware of touching certain things, involuntarily or unavoidable touch, and remembering things I had touched after the fact. I expanded this practice to studying the touches of my family; My toddler bouncing between play, me, herself and everything in her way. Our old and tired dog, who I may not have had a single data point for had I not chosen to start recording his touch from the moment he wasn’t asleep. My husband, who on some days probably touches more in an hour than any of us combined, and on others touches as little as our dog. What results of this bizarre study are both intersections and tangents, and an even greater realization of how touch awareness can either highlight links or expose divisions.
Joshua Duttweiler
infinitely close
Single channel video, 4:31, 2023
Memory is often the construction of emotions, senses, and images from the past. It is from this nebulous of sensory inputs at the instant they are occurring that we arrange into lines of thought, denoting meaning, connections, and order. However, our effort to rebuild a scene in our minds cannot fully reinstate the original experience and so we are left with a fleeting grasp of the initial inputs. In the void of certainty, we rebuild through memory. Reminiscent of a familiar time keeping device, these visual artifacts of the past are organized and reorganized to construct potential sequences of memory. They are collections of recollections, unbound realities yet infinitely close.
Christopher Field
Before/During/After
Digital video, 7:31, 2023
Before/During/After is a series of six time-based poems about time, memory, grief and discovery. Composed over the course of two years, the poems reflect on the elasticity of the individual moment and nod (spiritually if not formally) to the Transcendentalist movement of the early 19th century.
Lavaughan Jenkins
Let’s do every speakeasy
Oil paint over acrylic on wood panel, 2023
Vaishnavi Kumar
Records
Hand-cut paper tapestry, brass-plated fasteners, copper jump rings, 2023
Records is a tapestry of various emotional states experienced between June–December 2023. Going through multiple life-changing events in a seemingly endless liminal space, I turned to the one thing I know best; paper. Every event sparked by another, and every emotion layered between and betwixt the other. Layers are distinguished by motifs, each one representing a specific emotional state — sadness and anxiety, anger and frustration, joy and celebration, excitement and hope. The result is overwhelming; monochromatic layers of pattern and textures, sometimes hard to discern with clarity.
Cut entirely freehand and intuitively, the process itself reflects its tangential nature — each cut determines the next one.
William Haig
Chemigrams
2023
Chemigrams is an experimental series of large scale prints created using different chemicals on black and white photographic paper.
Kristen Mallia
Love Letter x Rome
Laser Printed Graphics, Homemade Wheatpaste (in collaboration with Lavaughan Jenkins), 2024
“Love Letter x Rome” is the third iteration of “Love Letter;” initially designed as a spell of transformation while on residency in Naples, Italy in June 2023, its content and wheatpaste application is informed by site-specific research, Italian graffiti, and the death notices adorning various surfaces throughout Naples. In its second iteration, it became publication (see: “Field Notes (Index_23): Issue 09 — rarevaluables.net). “Love Letter x Rome” is its latest iteration; its continued transformation is a reminder of the power of release, open space, and knowing what you want.
