Tarek Atoui / MATRIX 258

Berkeley, CA, October 8, 2015—The UC Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA) presents MATRIX 258, featuring the work of artist and electroacoustic composerTarek Atoui (b. 1980). Born in Lebanon and based in Paris, Atoui initiates and curates multidisciplinary interventions, concerts, performances, and workshops. His work often radiates around large-scale, collaborative performances that develop from extensive research into the history of music and instrumentation, while also exploring new methods for production. Using custom-built electronic instruments and computers, Atoui articulates social realities and histories in his work, while presenting music as a powerful mode of expression and identity. His MATRIX exhibition is the final installment in BAMPFA’s series of nomadic projects before it opens to its new building in downtown Berkeley on January 31, 2016.

Organized in conjunction with the Experimental Media and Performing Art Center (EMPAC) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in Troy, New York, Atoui’s MATRIX project is a continuation of his recent exploration into how sound is perceived by both the hearing and nonhearing. His MATRIX project began in March 2015, when Atoui spent three weeks at UC Berkeley coteaching an instrument-making seminar with art professor Greg Niemeyer, with the ultimate goal of realizing some of these new instrument designs. As part of this first phase, Atoui gave a lecture at the David Brower Center introducing new research and engagement with deaf communities and performed a concert at Meyer Sound’s acoustically sophisticated Pearson Theater. The second and final phase of MATRIX 258 comprises a series of concerts on November 5 and 7, at the Mills College Student Union and UC Berkeley’s Hearst Memorial Mining Building, respectively, that will premiere the new instruments. Performers include Bay Area new music luminaries such as James Fei, William Winant, as well as Mills College and UC Berkeley students and others.