Even at high-level East Coast institutions such as this one, certain habits and mythologies of “going to school” die hard.
Like, for instance, how most Hopkins bathroom stalls still have some aesthetic equivalent to “Here I sit, broken-hearted...” and JHU Confessions still stands as verbal stomping grounds for (k)ids gone wild.
These encoded behaviors also include, if more obliquely, that infantile object impermanence of the teacher, who, once we leave the classroom, either sort of vaporizes until next section or rolls out a mat under his desk and sleeps right there in his sport coat, resting his bespectacled head on an elbow patch.
Which is to say it can still be sort of stunning to hear that professors like Drew Daniel can and do actually put down their dog-eared and high-lit copy of “Tamburlaine” and pursue other projects.
In Daniel’s case, it is the collaborative experimental/conceptual/musique concrète duo Matmos.
Last Wednesday, as part of the inaugural JHU Arts Festival, Daniel and his partner M.C. Schmidt gave something close to an artists’ talk in Arellano Theater.
The presentation was brief, in order to let out for Matt Porterfield’s screening of Putty Hill and Hamilton (another prof. with a rich, successful extracurricular existence — this might actually be a common theme!).
However, in the short talk Daniel (doing most of the talking) and Schmidt showcased their music and video work (the latter helmed primarily by Schmidt) and contextualized their seemingly esoteric output.
Focusing mainly on 2006’s The Rose Has Teeth in the Mouth of a Beast, Daniel spoke discursively about the process and some of the theory behind the art.
Paraphrasing Sol LeWitt, Daniel noted that for Matmos, “the idea is the machine that makes the art,” grouping the outfit with conceptual art more broadly.
Daniel and Schmidt’s broader characterizations of their art, coupled with their discussions of process and inspiration, in which they told the audience, for example, how and why they placed snails on light-activated theremins to generate parts of their tribute to queer icon Patricia Highsmith, helped familiarize their art and make it more accessible.
Though brief, the talk provided valuable insight into the orthogonal lives led by some of JHU’s illustrious faculty, and how, if pressed, your stodgy prof. might have some freaky interests up his or her sleeve.
