The Alhambra Project
An art project by Lynn Marie Kirby (CCA Faculty) and Christoph Steger (CCA Faculty)
Friday September 30th 2016, 7 – 9pm
The Alhambra Theatre / Crunch Gym
2330 Polk St., Russian Hill, San Francisco
A night of video interventions and performances at the former Alhambra Theatre, now a Crunch Gym, on Polk Street in Russian Hill. Includes a mobile-app powered tour of the neighborhood incorporating interactive pieces at other local places of interest.
SAN FRANCISCO, CA (September 27, 2016) –– On September 30, artists Lynn Marie Kirby and Christoph Steger present a night of video, film and performance at the former Alhambra Theatre (built in 1926, modeled after the Alhambra Palace in Spain, and now a Crunch Gym) located in San Francisco’s Russian Hill neighborhood. The project takes over the gym’s video monitors with a cycle of six video works from artists around the world, and the public is invited to join in a schedule of exercise classes based on movements from films once screened in the Alhambra Theatre. Another artwork, in the form of a mobile web app, takes visitors on a local tour including audio interviews with residents, and animation at 17 stops around the neighborhood.
Kirby and Steger concurrently present a cycle of 6 video works on the Crunch gym’s own monitors. The installation includes video tours of both the interior and exterior of the original Alhambra, collected footage of local pets from today’s Russian Hill neighborhood, and a text piece by renowned artist and poet Etel Adnan in conversation with Kirby. Artist Omar Mismar examines bodybuilders working out in ruins instead of gyms and Binta Ayofemi will present a video of a waterfall. Interspersed throughout this cycle are animations by Steger based on the 17 possible kinds of infinitely repeatable patterns found in the original Alhambra palace. On the gym floor, the public is invited to participate in a series of performative exercise classes based on movements isolated from films screened at the Alhambra during its years as an operational movie theatre. The exercise class is choreographed by dancer Pearl Marill and run by Emma Manion. On the street outside the theater, artist Elaine Buckholtz is presenting a searchlight work.
The freely accessible mobile web app guides visitors around a short loop of the neighborhood with 17 geo-tagged locations that offer music, animations and audio of conversations with local Russian Hill residents, as well as merchants, artists, and scholars. The tour also stops at some local businesses, including free ice-cream at Swensen’s!
In addition to the event at 7pm, The Church for the Fellowship of All Peoples is hosting an Alhambra pattern drawing class and ice-cream social at 4pm for children ages 3 – 10, and parents. Then at 6pm Kirby and Steger will open an exhibition at Backstage Salon of large color prints featuring portraits of participants in the project that have been incorporated into one of the 17 tessellated mathematical patterns from the Alhambra Palace. My Nails on Green Street will offer Alhambra inspired manicures until 8pm and stop by William Cross Wine Bar for a taste of Spanish cava.
CALENDAR:
Event: September 30, 2016
Location: Alhambra Theater / Crunch Gym, 2330 Polk St., San Francisco and surrounds
Hours: 7-9pm
Admission: Free
18+ for events in gym
Included locations and events:
The Church for the Fellowship of All Peoples, 2041 Larkin St., 4pm – 5:30pm:
Pattern Drawing and Ice Cream Social for Kids (ages 3 – 10) and Parents, free.
Sponsored by Swensen’s.
Backstage Hair Salon, 2134 Polk St., 6pm – 8:30pm:
Wallpaper Pattern Exhibition Opening and Wine Reception, free.
Sponsored by Cole Hardware and Za pizza.
William Cross Wine Bar, 2253 Polk St., 7pm – 10pm:
A taste of Spanish Cava, free.
My Nails, 1204 Green St., 7pm – 8pm:
Alhambra inspired manicures
More Information: thealhambraproject.com
Instagram: @thealhambraproject
Email: info@thealhambraproject.com
Facebook event: www.facebook.com/events/
The project is funded by an SF Arts Commission Grant, and a CCA Faculty Development grant. It is supported by Crunch Corporate, with SF Cinematheque and the Russian Hill Neighbors as media co-sponsors, as well as generous donations from William Cross Wine Merchants, Swensen’s Ice cream, Cole Hardware, and Za Pizza.
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Lynn Marie Kirby is an interdisciplinary artist and filmmaker who uses emerging technologies and site interventions to excavate and reveal the traces and effects of the past on the present. She is a Professor of Fine Arts and Film at the California College of the Arts in San Francisco, California. Her work has been widely exhibited in galleries and museums, including the Whitney Museum of American Art; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Olympic Museum, Sarajevo; the Pompidou Centre in Paris; Strasbourg Museum of Contemporary Art, Arsenal, Berlin; Manage, St. Petersburg; Bio Paradis, Reykjavik; Fei Contemporary, Shanghai; LACE and Hammer in Los Angeles, the Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley; the Oakland Museum; the San Francisco Cinematheque, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, and the de Young Museum.
Kirby’s films and videos have shown at film festivals around the world including Oberhausen, Toronto, London, San Francisco and Athens. She is the recipient of grants and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, Djerassi Foundation, The National Endowment for the Arts, Film Arts Foundation, Jerome Foundation, Kelsey Street Press, and the City of San Francisco.
Christoph Steger is an artist filmmaker whose work explores the intersections of documentary, animation and experimental film. Incorporating traditional drawing, collage and computer generated images, his films highlight the relationship between reality and its representation through media. His recent pieces are formal investigations into the materiality of digital images.
His work has been shown at the International Documentary Festival Amsterdam, the Ottawa International Animation Festival, Tate Modern London, Arnolfini Bristol, the Clermont-Ferrand Short Film Festival and numerous other international film festivals and was screened on television in the United Kingdom and Europe. He received commissions from the Arts Council England and Channel Four TV. Recent video installations have been exhibited at the H&R Block Art Space in Kansas City.
Steger has worked on a wide range of cultural projects for BBC, Channel Four, Amnesty International, the Arts Council England and FACT Liverpool. He is also an Assistant Professor of Animation, Graphic Design and Fine Arts at California College of the Arts.
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PRESS CONTACT:
Erica Molesworth
Email: info@thealhambraproject.com
Phone: (415) 905-0308
Press image credits: Lynn Marie Kirby and Christoph Steger, 2016
