TDM Instructor Spotlight: SCRAAATCH

This week’s TDM Instructor Spotlight features Harvard College Media Fellows SCRAAATCH! SCRAAATCH is the sound and performance art collective of E. Jane and chukwumaa. This semester, they are teaching TDM 167SC: Nah; or, gestures of resistance: Performance, Technology, and Refusal. 

What excites you about working in TDM?

One thing that really excites us about TDM is the lean towards experimentation we see in many of the pedagogical approaches of other teachers.

The TDM students we’ve interacted with so far are super ready for experimentation as well and it’s great watching them interact with AFVS students; this interaction feels special and important because these two spaces already both contribute to performance art and new media practices. It feels like there is a real interest in performance in TDM and it’s fun to bring our perspective on performance art and new media to this space.

What do you do as an artist?

We make performance art, music, sound art, as well as installations that incorporate all the above. The performances often take the form of simple games or dialogues involving interactions with video, new media sculptures, and various electronic musical instruments. Most of the sound work we make takes the form of dance music or abstract electronic pieces that use sampling as well as electroacoustic sound synthesis. 

What’s something you’re excited about happening in the arts community right now?

We’re really enjoying “SCREENSAVERS VOL 1”, a music compilation by Anonymous Club that is just one result of a multi-year residency they’ve held at Luma Westbau in Zurich. We’re also looking forward to Chuquimamani-Condori (Elysia Crampton Chuquimia) and Joshua Chuquimia Crampton’s forthcoming debut solo show, “Amaru’s Tongue: Daughter” at Auto Italia in London. Both Chuquimia and Anonymous are examples of artists/artist communities working across disciplines to make dynamic work and this approach is very important to us. 

Photo Credits:

Photo 1: Photo by Elliott Jerome Brown Jr

Photo 2: Tower of Babel (2019) Les Urbaines Festival, Lausanne, Switzerland

Photo 3: Photo by Derek Shultz courtesy MoMA PS1