Ryoji Ikeda & Ensemble Modern
Together with Ensemble Modern and Muziekgebouw Amsterdam, the Dresden Days of Contemporary Music have commissioned Japanese artist Ryoji Ikeda to create a new piece for string instruments. Following its world premiere in Amsterdam on February 8, this work will be performed in HELLERAU on March 15, 2024; Les Percussions de Strasbourg will present another concert project by Ikeda in HELLERAU with “100 Cymbals” (commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic 2019) on April 7, 2024.
Ryoji Ikeda is one of the most important international sound and media artists. His large-scale light and sound installations have been shown in numerous museums and galleries around the world for many years. In Europe, the Centre Pompidou in Paris recently dedicated a major exhibition to him in 2018. In the same year, he transformed Hall E in the MuseumsQuartier into an oversized world of data, particles, light and sounds with “micro | macro” for the Vienna Festival. In 2019/20, the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg presented “data-verse” 1 and 2, two new large-scale projections created especially for the museum.
In addition to his immersive and installation works, Ikeda can also regularly be seen with musical-performative projects such as “superposition” (most recently Philharmonie de Paris 2022) or “A (for 100 Cars)”, a concert performance for 100 cars in Los Angeles in 2017. The artist’s links with Ensemble Modern include a commissioned composition for a new choreography by William Forsythe, which premiered in Frankfurt in 2004. Similar to “100 Cymbals”, the new work for string instruments will not only develop a clear and purely analog musical concept, but also precise choreographic elements for the musicians of Ensemble Modern.