about the art
This month we’re contemplating art as expansion through a pairing of music by Ben Richter, film by Xuan, and mail art by Calethia DeConto. Together they celebrate the feeling of stretching out, looking widely, and filling your lungs to capacity.
As a composer and accordionist, Ben’s sprawling and expansive music explores the extended microtonal and timbral potential of the accordion. In his film piece, Time Whorl Canyon, we begin by watching Ben improvise in Southern California’s Las Virgenes Canyon. Then, filmmaker Xuan transports us into a snowy landscape with footage that explores expanses of the unknown and unseen. Her video is accompanied by Ben’s composed music, that features his accordion improvisation accompanied by bells, banjos, and other sounds.
For visual artist Calethia DeConto, who works in lens-based photography, collage, and cyanotype, the natural world is her deepest source of inspiration and fascination. This month's mail art is one of her hand-embellished photographs depicting a landscape with a female form that is painted with silver dots. Caletheia describes the dots in the photograph as representing “all the souls from everywhere as we connect with one another, the universe and our Creator!”