ing costume

The last couple weeks have been a whirlwind of costume making. My brother and his friend Max have a band called ing. Yesterday they performed at LACMA (LA County Museum of Art) for a project put on by the gallery Machine Project. The museum was taken over by many artists, musicians and performers with art installations, music, classes and more. ing took on the feat of performing for seven hours while walking around the museum without stopping. They did this while dressed as an alien, which is where I became involved.

A couple weeks ago we met to discuss what kind of costume they wanted. We decided on a pair of smocks connected by a tube between their chests and hood/masks covering their faces. Every part of their bodies was covered by the costume. In addition, the smocks had to transport all of their musical instruments.
We journeyed to the fashion district of LA and picked out this metallic hologram fabric.
From there my work began.
Many hours and a few late nights later, the costume was complete and the band was dressed and ready to perform. The official description of their performance:

ing
Slow Walking Color Takers
Two travelers from another dimension are transported to LACMA in search of vibrant color combinations. Upon discovery, specific colors elicit mysterious sounds from the alien tourists.

The whole day was amazing. I loved seeing people react to their performance. Reactions varied from joy and wonderment to confusion and fear. It was awesome and exhausting. There are more pictures in my flickr stream (slideshow here).

ing synopsis 1

ing is a super fantastically entertaining band co-headed by my dear brother John. To quickly describe them, the performances are part music and part performance art. Both members are very skilled musicians who allow themselves to improvise. Every show is completely different. What will happen at an ing performance can not be predicted. So I started thinking I need to document my experience of some of the events.

June 7, 8 pm
Dangerous Curve
Los Angeles, CA

01. a small gathering of spectators, the type you'd call intimate. There are spotlights on the performance area.
02. John and Max sit at a square table. John has a guitar and a laptop. Max has a small keyboard and his trumpet. There are other little noise making objects around.
03. John presses the space bar on his laptop and a steady beat starts.
04. John quietly plucks the guitar. Max alternates between keyboard and trumpet.
05. Both play bells.
06. Max starts rolling his chair around the performance space. He realizes it's pretty fun. He bounces off walls. He has a great shadow on the brick wall. He returns to the table.
07. Max plays a drum and bells. John plays music too.
08. Max stands up takes John's hand and swirls him around so he is no longer facing the audience.
09. John and Max play the guitar together. I can't really see what's going on.
10. Max sings about people gathering for fun and eating. John joins in. "And we ate all day long"
11. Max returns to his seat and they finish playing music
12. Hearty round of applause from all attendees
13. Max and John high five
14. A brief Q and A
15. John eats cookies