Wave Farm Presents Negativland at Greenville Drive-In

Drive-in theaters are not just for sci-fi double features or the latest animated family fair anymore. Venues like the recently revitalized Greenville Drive-In are attracting a new audience of “culture vultures” – from the Hudson Valley and beyond – by programming special events that marry adventurous elements of sound, cinema and the latest in multimedia technology.

On May 31, Greenville Drive-In will host Wave Farm Presents: Negativland + Sue-C + Matmos. Produced in partnership with PlayTime, the event will showcase some of the most critically acclaimed artists working in a genre that combines sampled sounds and images, original electronic scores, live performances and cutting-edge audiovisual technology.

Wave Farm, the event’s presenter, is an internationally renowned media arts center, media platform, and arts service organization based in the Upper Hudson Valley. It operates the popular free-form FM radio station WGXC-90.7 FM and hosts many online radio channels and podcasts. Wave Farm’s offerings also encompass interdisciplinary art installations, artist residencies and fellowships, and a research library. The May 31 event is the latest in a series presented by Wave Farm at the Greenville Drive-In.

“This event is a real dream come true for Wave Farm,” says Galen Joseph-Hunter, the organization’s Executive Director. “Negativland has long been revered as one of the most adventurous and audacious groups pushing the boundaries of radio as a creative medium. Matmos’ music is also extraordinary, in having such profound conceptual strength without forgoing accessibility and entertainment value. We are delighted to once again partner with the Greenville Drive-in as we did for the 10th Anniversary celebration for our radio station in 2021.”

Galen-Joseph continues: “The performances will take place live on-stage with visuals projected across the drive-in’s massive screen. The sound will be amplified in the Biergarten and also transmitted to audiences via their car radios. The public will also be invited to listen in as we broadcast it live on WGXC 90.7-FM: Radio for Open Ears.”

At approximately 9:45 pm on the evening of May 31, Negativland and SUE-C will present “We Can Really Feel Like We’re Here.” Their latest audio-visual collaboration explores our minds, our realities and the many forms of media and technology that orchestrate our perceptions. The WIRE Magazine writes: “An urgent show by Negativland and artist SUE-C calls time on a tech dystopia that is as malevolent as it is stupid… to meet the terrifying contemporary moment… as the world slides incrementally into meltdown.”

Since 1980, Negativland has been creating records, CDs, videos, fine art, books, radio and live performances using appropriated sounds, images, objects and text. Mixing original materials and original music with things taken from corporately-owned mass culture and the world around them, Negativland re-arranges these found bits and pieces to make them say and suggest things that they never intended to. In doing this kind of cultural archaeology and “culture jamming” (a term they coined way back in 1984), Negativland has been sued twice for copyright infringement (most notably by the band U2). Their art and media interventions pose both serious and silly questions about the nature of sound, media, technology, control, ownership, propaganda, power and perception.

Sue Slagle (SUE-C) is an award-winning artist, engineer and educator whose work in “real-time cinema” presents a new, imaginative perspective on live performance. Her performances blend cinema and technology into an improvisational and immersive act, works created with live cameras, light pads and video algorithms. Slagle has always pushed the boundaries of human-computer interaction, employing emerging technologies and inventing many of her own, both through performance and tinkering with hundreds of students in her well-established teaching practice.

Matmos is a duo comprised of Drew Daniel and M.C. Schmidt. The two have been making music under this moniker since 1997, first in San Francisco and then after relocating to Baltimore in 2007. They are respected, innovative auteurs in the world of electronic music and sampling culture whose very first album was hailed as “entering electronics Valhalla” by The WIRE for sampling highly unusual sound sources such as the amplified nerve tissue of crayfish.

Ever since they have made music out of a wildly heterogeneous set of objects and sources. These include the sound of the pages of Bibles turning, liposuction surgery, contact microphones on human hair, rat cages, tanks of helium, human skulls, whoopee cushions, snails interrupting the path of a laser, silicone breast implants, their own washing machine and much more. These raw materials are manipulated into surprisingly accessible forms and often supplemented with traditional musical instruments played by celebrated guests. Matmos will take the stage as the sun sets at 8:30 pm to transmit audio to car radios while projecting images on the drive-in’s big screen.

Local musician and visual artist Rodney Alan Greenblat will kick off the event with a performance of his intriguing electronic music in the Biergarten at 8:00 pm.

“Since re-booting the drive-in, we’ve viewed it more as a community arts space rather than a traditional drive-in theater,” adds Dwight Grimm, co-owner of the Greenville Drive-In. “The events we’ve done with Wave Farm and WGXC are an example of how we like to partner with and give a wide berth to the most edge-pushing creators. It’s giving the public truly unique events and creators a space to express their wildest and weirdest impulses.”

Established in 1959 by Peter Carelas, the Greenville Drive-In has been a social fixture and destination in the Northern Catskills for over six decades. The drive-in was revived and re-imagined after a brief period of transition by Dwight Grimm and Leigh Van Swall in 2015. The couple began by upgrading the projection system and audio transmission to modern digital platforms and by building a licensed Biergarten with a performing stage by the concession stand. Locally produced beer, wine, sodas and snacks were added to its menu. The drive-in also features specialty cocktails, ones often created by Grimm to celebrate the themes of the movies presented as a part of its “Cinema with A Twist” program. The Greenville Drive-In’s programming has also shifted away from a dependence on mainstream first-run features to an eclectic line-up of retro, independent and filmmaker-direct offerings.

Sal Cataldi is a music, writer and former publicist living in Saugerties, NY.

Photos by Jennifer Bennett + Filip Preis + Beth Schneck

Wave Farm Presents: Negativland + Sue-C and Matmos

Tickets for the May 31 event are $25.00 in Advance ($30 at Door). Doors at 7 pm, music begins at 8 pm.
Greenville Drive-in, 10700 New York Route 32, Greenville NY
Tix HERE + Info HERE.

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