A key aspect of Jason Moran’s career as a jazz musician and visual artist has been research, including poring over archival photos of stages at legendary jazz clubs of decades past, like the Savoy Ballroom, the Three Deuces, and Slug’s Saloon. “But they were never enough to satisfy my urge to feel what it was like to sit inside one.”
In a new Artspeaks video, Moran discusses the three stages he recreated—both as art objects and as performance spaces within the galleries—for his Walker-organized exhibition, Jason Moran. “Even though I was trained by some great people, they didn’t put the notion in my mind that you should consider the frame. That even when you step on the stage at the Village Vanguard, that itself is a frame, and that frame has history, too.”
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