After an incredible 15th anniversary celebration in July, KOOKOO now tests states of precarious equilibrium on uncertain terrain. The music of INSIJAM and ANNA BUTTER and a performative intervention by MEGUMI EDA explore how opposites enhance the qualities of each element in their encounters. How differences can coexist and find common ground, if only for fleeting moments.
‘How did we get there?’ was the question posed by Rami Abi Rafi aka INSIJAM with his contribution to a fundraising project to preserve the heritage of the city of Beirut in the aftermath of the port disaster in 2020. INSIJAM means ‘harmony’ in Arabic. It is the word Rami has chosen to represent his main musical project (and the title of his Cashmere Radio show). Subtly confronting and surprising, INSIJAM fuses musique concrète with traditional Lebanese music and influences from jazz and improv to evoke themes of memory, migration, and forced exile. At KOOKOO, Rami presents a live set that draws inspiration from Dickie Landry’s album Having Been Built On Sand (1978), featuring the voices of Tina Girouard, Britta Le Va, and Lawrence Weiner.
While MEGUMI EDA builds on a solid foundation of classical dance training, her most recent work reaches far into uncharted territory. After a career focused on interpretation (for prestigious companies such as the Dutch National Ballet and Armitage Gone! Dance in New York), she has evolved into a multimedia performing artist. Of her incredible ability to transform, Laurie Anderson once said: ‘Megumi can morph in a flash from small boy to impossibly regal diva to a small squirrel chewing on a nut.’
Sound artist ANNA BUTTER might opt for turning into a jellyfish instead. With a background in fine art and fluidity, and as a highly imaginative DJ, Anna works with impulse and flow. Water is a recurring theme in her practice, be it as a sound source in her productions and radio collages (such as her Hyena Calls show on 90mil Radio), as a metaphor for states of flux, or as a theoretical space that expands into the realm of hydro-feminism.
Visual artists and KOOKOO residents CARLY FISCHER and YUKIHIRO TAGUCHI further explore ambiguous balances in their contributions, while KOOKOO hosts MIEKO SUZUKI & ARA propose this as provisional conclusion: Sand means surprises.
