John Cage

That's the cover for the Creative Loafing this week, showing a picture of Christian Marclay taking part in the current running exhibition in the Tampa Museum of Arts, one of two pieces showing last week in tribute to the one hundredth anniversary of the birth of John Cage, the other being the exhibition "Things Not Seen Before" in the Tempus Gallery.

Both shows are curated by Jade Dellinger, who I had the pleasure of meeting in person. He talked at length about both projects, from the process of randomly selecting the placement for the visual works in the Tempus Gallery (darts over is shoulder - Cage had a certain love for randomness, using various methods such as the I Ching in his own work) to finding amazing obscure albums for the Tampa Museum's "33 1/3", originally "performed" by John Cage in 1969. The Museum offers up more complete information on that show here. For more information on the Tempus Show, you can read up on it at the John Cage Trust's blog, which also dips into some interesting information about mycology.

John Cage's 33 1/3 is really an interesting piece in concept, but more so to see it played. I was lucky enough to come with a large group, so there were plenty of us mixing tunes on the 17 record players there. The records themselves were vastly varied, from obscure bands, sound effects and vocal exercises to well known favorites. The mix was bizarrely pleasant at times, and still fascinating when it was dissonant. Eventually the group mostly dispersed and I was left listening to a few albums play out - old folk tunes (an album with a bit of a story - Dellinger was told to track it down by the Residents, and it was by sheer luck and after some time that he stumbled across it via a collector of vinyl, a signed copy nonetheless) set to a backing of the Velvet Underground and Nico and one of Christian Marclay's notorious red records, though I am sad to have forgotten which one.

Sadly the Tempus show is now closed, but I urge any locals to check out 33 1/3 if they have a chance. Also being shown are works by Romare Bearden and William Pachner.