Discovering the Music of Photography
with Oliver Prezant and Friends
featuring the artwork of Grant Johnson
Saturday, June 3, from 2:00 – 3:30 p.m.
General admission: $25
Seating is limited, purchase your tickets HERE.
An interactive, musical exploration of large-scale photographs by Grant Johnson, featuring Oliver Prezant and improvising musicians Carla Kountoupes, violin; Jerry Weimer, clarinet; and Katie Harlow, cello.
You’ve seen landscape painters step back from their work to get the “big picture” before returning to the canvas to work on the details. Well, photographer Grant Johnson’s work is based on ultra-high resolution images of remote, undisturbed land taken from seven or eight miles up! From so far away, mountains, riverbeds, forests, and sand dunes have the appearance of richly textured, remarkably colorful organic shapes. During the program, conductor and arts educator Oliver Prezant will lead an interactive exploration of these extraordinary images, and your thoughts and impressions will be the basis for musical realizations of the artwork by Oliver and violinist Carla Kountoupes, clarinetist Jerry Weimer, and cellist Katie Harlow. In the words of the artist: “My fascination with these images is their abstract beauty as compositions and their resemblance to abstract expressionist painting.” The artist will be present during the program.
This event is a production of Opus OP Arts and Education Projects.
Thanks to Opus OP Arts and Education Project event sponsors: Don and Andrea Fineberg, and Sallie Bingham.
Program and artists subject to change.
Grant Johnson, from the Undisclosed Locations series. Dye Sub-Print on aluminum panel.
Photo captions and credits from left to right:
Conductor and arts educator Oliver Prezant: Ruthanne Greeley
Violinist Carla Kountoupes: Will Wilson (Diné)
Clarinetist Jerry Weimer: Nacha Mendez
Cellist Katie Harlow: Joseph Sabella
Artist Biographies:
Grant Johnson, photographer, grew up on a farm in Arkansas where his family raised cattle and grew alfalfa. He spent a large amount of time in the outdoors which over the years morphed into an interest in environmental issues. He received a BFA from the University of Arizona where he painted and learned rudimentary photography. He became interested in electronic imagery when the first remotely sensed planetary landscape photography began to appear in the late ‘60s. Fascinated by NASA's Landsat photography, which began to appear in 1972, he was inspired to learn more about electronic imaging. He applied to the Rhode Island School of Design's nascent video department and received the first graduate degree in experimental video awarded by RISD in 1975. He worked with analog computer systems for video and audio synthesis and eventually their digital counterparts. Landsat imagery became available in 2008 when the entire archive entered the public domain, and it became possible to identify a location, collect the satellite images, and compose the columns and rows of images into a large, coherent, very high-resolution landscape. He was an assignment photographer for The Nature Conservancy for twenty years, covering California and Hawaii. His work attempts to call attention to environmental questions and answers that would help preserve the world in a state in which we can continue to thrive.
Oliver Prezant, conductor and arts educator, has presented lectures and education programs for the Santa Fe Opera, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, National Hispanic Cultural Center, Performance Santa Fe, the Tanglewood Association of Volunteers, Road Scholar, and the Guilds of the Santa Fe and San Francisco Opera companies. As the music director and conductor of the Santa Fe Community Orchestra, he worked with community musicians and choristers, professional soloists, public school music students, composers, creative artists, and community partners from Santa Fe and northern New Mexico to present a wide variety of innovative performances, unique education programs, and community collaborations. He has presented programs on the relationship of art and music for the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, the Albuquerque Museum of Art, the New Mexico Museum of Art, and the Anderson Museum of Contemporary Art. Oliver was one of the founding teaching artists in Partners in Education’s ArtWorks Program, which provides arts education workshops for Santa Fe Public Schools students and teachers in the areas of music, poetry, visual art, theater, and dance. As the artistic advisor to the program, he trained teaching artists and classroom teachers, and coordinated with area poets, museums, and other arts organizations. He studied at the Mannes College of Music in New York City and the Pierre Monteux School for conductors in Hancock, Maine, and he was an Assistant Professor in the Contemporary Music Program at the College of Santa Fe and an instructor at Santa Fe University of Art and Design.
Carla Kountoupes, violinist, is a member of the Santa Fe Symphony Orchestra, Arizona Opera Orchestra, Santa Fe Pro Musica Chamber Orchestra, and Piazzolla da Camera Piano Trio. Carla has toured and performed professionally with orchestras and chamber ensembles in Central America, Taiwan, Germany, and all over the United States, including as a member of the New Century Chamber Orchestra in San Francisco and the Costa Rican National Symphony Orchestra. She enjoys performing and recording many genres in addition to classical, including Latin/world, alt-rock/pop, and jazz. A dedicated music educator, Carla is on the faculty at the New Mexico School for the Arts. She is a graduate of Oberlin Conservatory (Violin Performance) and Oberlin College (English Literature). Carla’s violin was made in the 1740s and was inherited from her grandfather.
Jerry Weimer is a composer and clarinetist who has been a part of the Santa Fe music scene since 2001. Known for his unique sound, stylistic versatility, and compelling improvisations, Jerry is a regular presence in the Jazz and Latin music communities of Northern New Mexico, and was a featured soloist with the Santa Fe Community Orchestra in Weber’s Clarinet Concerto No. 1. He has collaborated with many local artists, including Nacha Mendez, Joaquin Gallegos, Jono Manson, Nosotros, Rumelia, John Rangel, the Shiners Club Jazz Band, Revózo, and Victor Alvarez’s SAVOR. Recent performances include Le Carnaval des Animaux with the National Dance Institute, and Amane, with Joe Hay, Words in the Wind, with Melanie Monsour, and Zozobra in 2021. Jerry is a graduate of the College of Santa Fe where he studied with Eddie Daniels.
Katie Harlow, cellist, has performed on cello, mandolin, accordion, and viola da gamba in numerous symphonic, chamber, early, folk, and improvised music ensembles, including the Santa Fe Symphony, the Chamber Orchestra of Albuquerque, New Music New Mexico, the New Mexico Women Composer's Guild, Opera Southwest, the early music groups Three Bass Blondes and the Boxwood Consort, the improvising music ensembles Out of Context and Playroom, the Bill Horvitz Band (jazz and new music), Cicadas, a mandolin ensemble, the folk music groups Bailiwick and Caledonia, and the band Basement Dancing. In addition, she has created arrangements and compositions for concerts, recordings, and theater productions. Katie holds a Bachelors in Cello Pedagogy and a Masters in Music Education from the University of New Mexico, and was on the faculty of Albuquerque Academy for many years.
Media Contact: Oliver Prezant
Phone: 505-660-8834
email: oliver@oliverprezant.com