As a composer, animator, DJ, and radio playwright, Felix Kubin has been exploring boundaries between East and West for more than two decades. Working from Hamburg—thirty miles from the Cold War’s inner German border—Kubin is best known for his rampantly eclectic electronic music, which imagines an alternate Soviet-dominated future, appropriately accompanied by a burbling, space-age soundtrack. This longing, projected across the iron curtain, is further articulated by Kubin’s participation in the Dada-Communist singing group Liedertafel Margot Honecker; the radio play Territerrortorium, a German-Polish noise battle with the artist Wojtek Kucharczyk (Skoczow, Poland); and an extensive collection of Eastern European underground music.
For this event, organized in conjunction with the exhibition “Ostalgia,” Kubin will present two related programs. The first will be an exploration of sound art and experimental music in Eastern Europe, drawing from the audio program "Parasol Elektroniczny: Rumours From The Eastern Underground" curated by Kubin for Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA). Drawing on three decades of audio recordings and interviews made in Estonia, Hungary, the Czech Republic/Slovakia and Serbia/Croatia, Kubin will discuss the music, cultural politics, economy, and survival tactics important to the artists in each country.
Following this presentation, Kubin will perform a concert of music created for theater and radio play. These rarely performed compositions are Kubin’s most gorgeous and adventurous works, artfully obliterating conventional orchestral sources and positioning him as the heir to electronic innovators Raymond Scott, Bruce Haack, and Pierre Henry.