Projection Designer: Cramer Quartet (5BMF)

Had the beautiful opportunity to be invited to collaborate with the amazing Cramer Quartet on their Seven Last Words project:

an immersive string quartet performance that interweaves seven recently commissioned works by living American composers Jessica Meyer, Colin Jacobsen, Nico Muhly, Tania León*, Reena Esmail, Paola Prestini, and Caroline Shaw* with Franz Joseph Haydn's nine-movement masterpiece The Seven Last Words of Christ.

This was the first iteration of this collaboration, and it was presented at the Sheen Center in NYC via the Five Boroughs Music Festival. I have been really impressed with the programming and trajectory of this commission, and how it juxtaposes contemporary with period music - the contemporary pieces being reflections on each of the Haydn movements by different composers.

I was drawn to grounding the Haydn movements in sacred architecture - particularly in exploring darkness and light. Instead, in the contemporary pieces I would bring this photographic style onto different topics - after 'father forgive them' I explored interpreting each of those phrases in a modern context, looking at destruction from war, immigration.

I really look forward to future iterations of this project, and to explore further site-specific iterations of it.