Antony confirmed as Director of Southbank Centre's Meltdown Festival in August 2012


Wednesday 1 – Friday 12 August 2012, Southbank Centre The Observer is Media Partner of Meltdown 2012

Southbank Centre announces that musician / visual artist Antony has accepted the invitation to curate the 19th Meltdown festival, which takes place in August for the first time in 2012. The avant-garde performer and lead singer with Mercury Award-winning Antony and the Johnsons, follows in the footsteps of previous directors including Jarvis Cocker, Robert Wyatt, Laurie Anderson, Patti Smith, Ornette Coleman, David Bowie and, most recently, Ray Davies

Taking over the venues and spaces of London's iconic, riverside arts centre, the artist who emerged from the New York underground art scene of the early 1990s will curate twelve days of music, debate and performance that reflect his interests, influences and passions. Issues close to his heart - ranging from environment and spirituality to gender politics - will be among themes explored through the festival.  

Antony’s Meltdown is part of the Southbank Centre’s Festival of the World with MasterCard, which runs from 1 June to 9 September 2012.  

Antony, 19th Director of Southbank Centre’s Meltdown festival, said:

"I want to create a kind of paradise. I want to walk through that forest and see and hear the hardcore beauty and strength in art and music that makes sense to me. The weather is changing and everybody knows it. I want to participate; What is my relationship and responsibility to the world around me?  Frontier expressions of emotion and beauty can be fantastic tools with which to enter that discussion." 

Jude Kelly, Artistic Director at Southbank Centre, said:
"From the moment we heard his voice, or caught an early glimpse of him stealing the show on jaw-dropping guest spots, there was no doubt that Antony was a major talent. In the decade since, a series of acclaimed recordings and performances, a host of well-selected collaborators and immaculately delivered commissions have confirmed his status as one of the most fascinating artists of our age. Each director takes Meltdown in a different direction. We can’t wait to see where Antony will take the festival and us in August 2012.”

Jane Beese, Head of Contemporary Music at Southbank Centre, said:
"To say that he embodies the transgressive spirit of the New York underground only tells part of the story. With lyrics that intertwine the global and the deeply personal - delivered with a heartbreaking intensity matched by few performers past or present - he has touched the lives of many. We are thrilled and honoured that he has agreed to share his world with us through twelve days of Meltdown."

 

More about Antony: 

Born in Sussex, England, Antony also spent his childhood in Amsterdam and the San Francisco Bay Area before moving to NYC at the age of 19. In 1992, he founded the performance collective Blacklips at the Pyramid Club, and spent the next several years developing his voice and ideas on late night stages around NYC.

Antony emerged with his musical ensemble Antony and the Johnsons in 1998. In 2005 Antony and the Johnsons won the UK's Mercury Prize for the album I am a Bird Now.  Ann Powers of the LA Times wrote upon the release of 2009's The Crying Light“it’s the most personal environmentalist statement possible, making an unforeseen connection between queer culture's identity politics and the green movement. As music, it's simply exquisite.” 


In 2006 Antony collaborated with filmmaker Charles Atlas on TURNING, a concert and live video installation. The Guardian called the Barbican’s presentation of TURNING, "fragile, life affirming, and truly wonderful (five stars)."  Le Monde hailed TURNING at the Olympia in Paris as "Concert-manifeste transsexuel." Since 2008, Antony has performed with orchestras throughout the world, including The London Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican, The Chamber Orchestra of Sydney at Sydney Opera House, The Orchestra of St. Luke’s at Lincoln Center, and the Brooklyn Philharmonic at BAM. Antony and The Johnsons' presentation of The Crying Light at the Manchester Festival 2009 was included in Klaus Biesenbach’s 100 Years: A History of Performance Art, at MoMA PS1.  Last summer, Antony was the musical director and a performer in the critically lauded The Life and Death of Marina Abramović, directed by Robert Wilson. This piece will tour Madrid, Amsterdam, Basel and Antwerp in Spring 2012.

In late January 2012, Antony and the Johnsons performed the Rough Trade album Swanlights commissioned by The Museum of Modern Art to a sold out crowd at Radio City Music Hall. This one time performance event featured a 60-piece orchestra, light artist Chris Levine, light designer Paul Normandale and set designer Carl Robertshaw.  The NY Times lauded the performance as “gorgeously appointed cries from the heart, crashing like waves”.

Antony has collaborated with a wide-ranging group of artists and musicians including Björk, Yoko Ono, Laurie Anderson, CocoRosie, and Lou Reed. Reed has said, "When I first heard him I knew I was in the presence of an angel.” Anderson adds, “Two words and he has broken your heart. When he sings it is the most exquisite thing you will hear in your life.”

Antony is also an accomplished visual artist and has exhibited his drawings at Palais Des Beaux Arts in Belgium, Isis Gallery in London, Accademia Albertina in Turin and the Triennale in Milan.  In 2009 he curated a group show entitled Six Eyes at Agnès B. Galerie Du Jour in Paris, which included work by Peter Hujar, Kiki Smith, and William Basinski.  In October of 2010, Antony released a book of collages and drawings, also called Swanlights, published by Abrams Image. An exhibition of Antony’s drawings are currently on display at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, curated by James Elaine. "A case could be made that [Antony] himself is following some uncharted lines as an artist and performer..."– New York Times. 

 

 

March 14, 2012 3:08pm ET by Bang On PR   Comments (0)

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