Deru, featuring EFFIXX: 1979
CCM’s Division of Electronic Media, in collaboration with the Contemporary Arts Center, welcomes guest artists Benjamin Wynn and Anthony Ciannamea for a public presentation and master class at 3 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 22 in room 425 of UC’s Tangeman University Center. This event is free and open to the general public.
Wynn (who produces electronic music under the name “Deru”) and Ciannamea (who runs a studio focused on telling stories with physical objects in real spaces called “EFFIXX”) will discuss their work 1979, which will be featured at the Contemporary Arts Center on Saturday, Jan. 24.
In addition to presenting, Wynn and Ciannamea will interact with students from UC and Northern Kentucky University, lending guidance, instruction and support.
“These guys make great music, film, media, and art,” explains Assistant Professor of Electronic Media Lorin Edwin Parker. “This is a fantastic opportunity, and the Contemporary Arts Center and [CAC performance curator and CCM alumnus] Drew Klein (BFA Electronic Media, 2007) are so great to bring them out to Cincy!”
A concept album, performance, and sculptural object, 1979 features nine songs by Wynn accompanied by nine short films by video artist Ciannamea that are housed in a customized handheld video projector called the Obverse Box. The subject matter found within is nostalgic and emotive, focusing on common origins and shared human experiences.
Deru, featuring EFFIXX: 1979 will have its Cincinnati premiere a 8 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 24, at the Contemporary Arts Center. Tickets are $10 for members, $15 for the general public. For more information on this premiere, visit http://contemporaryartscenter.org.
About Benjamin Wynn
Benjamin Wynn is an Emmy Award winning American composer, sound designer and music producer.
Wynn grew up in Chicago, where his earliest influences came across the airwaves of the legendary University of Chicago radio station, WHPK. Listening to hip-hop and specifically its use of static in music, prompted Wynn’s first forays into manipulating sound. Wynn continued his sonic explorations at the California Institute of the Arts, where he studied synthesis, signal processing, acoustics, music theory and composition, and earned a Bachelor’s degree in Music Technology. While at CalArts, Wynn also delved into world music, studying Balinese gamelan, African drumming and hand percussion. His multi-layered musical sensibility combines hip-hop, electronic, world music and classical composition.
Wynn is co-owner of a music and sound design company in Los Angeles called, The Track Team. Wynn started The Track Team with co-founder Jeremy Zuckerman in 2004.
Together they have done music for the Nickelodeon TV series, Kung Fu Panda: Legends of Awesomeness, created the score for the feature film Just Peck, and music and sound design for DC Comics shorts. Wynn is currently working on the sound design for the sequel to Avatar the Last Airbender, Avatar: The Legend of Korra. In 2012, Ben and Jeremy won an Emmy Award for music editing for Kung Fu Panda: Legends of Awesomeness.
Wynn was the force behind the sound design for all three seasons of Nickelodeon’s hit television show, Avatar the Last Airbender. In 2009, Wynn was nominated for a Motion Picture Sound Editor’s Golden Reel award for his sound design work on Avatar: The Last Airbender.
Wynn is also an electronic music producer under the name “Deru”. His music is best described as an amalgamation of hip-hop, electronic and IDM. He is signed to the label Mush Records and has released three albums on Mush Records, Merck Records and Neo Ouija and many remixes and tracks for compilations for labels like Hometapes, Ghostly International, Hymen Records, 1320 Records, Unseen and Mille Plateaux.
Deru recently scored the music and curated the soundtrack for the feature-length film, Outliers, Vol. I: Iceland. The score is based on his field recordings from a trip to Iceland in October 2011. The film premiered in Chicago in July 2012 and in Sopot, Poland and Amsterdam, Netherlands in September 2012.
In 2007, Wynn (as Deru) collaborated with British composer Joby Talbot on the score to Wayne McGregor’s ballet, Genus, based on Charles Darwin’s book, On the Origin of Species, commissioned by the Paris Opera Ballet. The ballet premiered at the Palais Garnier in October 2007 and was commissioned for a second round of performances in November 2009. The ambitious eight-part score combines electronics with a 10-part choir and string instruments. The score is available on Ant-Zen and Dear Oh Dear Records and was featured in the 2009 documentary, La Danse: The Paris Opera Ballet.
About Anthony Ciannamea
Anthony Ciannamea is a Chicago-born filmmaker and designer inspired by the intersection of technology, mythology and mysticism in storytelling. After nearly a decade as an interface designer and creative coder in Chicago, Anthony co-founded ScenicStudio.tv and has spent past few years directing a series of music videos and a feature-length documentary (Outliers, Vol. I: Iceland). The now San Francisco-based creative director is currently focused on bringing his analog, lo-fi cinema aesthetic to live performance visuals as well as helping artists and independent labels introduce dimensional narrative into releases.
Obsessed with blending digital processes and modern tools with an anthropological curiosity to re-contextualize the past, he recently spent the past year producing live visuals as a monthly resident at Low End Theory SF, on tour with Shigeto, as well as events for Deru and Prefuse 73.
Anthony runs EFFIXX – a small studio focused on making beautiful things and telling stories with physical objects in real spaces.
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