zachlayton

zach layton

brooklyn

Bio: Zach Layton is a guitarist, composer, curator, improviser, teacher and video artist based in Brooklyn. His work investigates unconscious autonomic musical impulses via improvisation and indeterminacy. Using an EEG, which monitors brainwave signal in realtime, he is able to sonify and visualize this stream of unconscious data. His music involves a combination of digital and analog processes, field recordings and electric guitar played in non-standard tunings. Zach’s work has been performed by the cleveland chamber symphony and he has performed and exhibited at the kitchen, issue project room, roulette, diapason, PS1/MoMa, anthology film archives, joe’s pub, performa, exit art, SCOPE art fair, art forum berlin, phillips de pury, new york electronic art festival, yerba buena center for the arts, eyebeam, sculpture center, millenium film workshop, st. mark’s ontological theater, bard college, dumbo arts festival, transmediale berlin, new york digital salon, miguel abreu gallery, participant gallery, monkeytown and many other spaces in new york, south america and europe. He has collaborated with Luke Dubois, Vito Acconci, Elliott Sharp, The Joshua Light Show, Jonas Mekas, Tony Conrad, Bradley Eros, Alex Waterman, Nick Hallett, Andrew Lampert, Matthew Ostrowski, Michael Evans, MV Carbon, Seth Kirby, Matthew Welch, Christine Bard, Andy Graydon, Ryan Sawyer, Matt Mottel, Bradford Reed, Emily Manzo, Patrick Hambrecht, Marissa Olsen, Angie Eng, Adam Kendall, Chika Ijima, Peter Gordon, Peter Zummo, Tristan Perich and Ray Sweeten and many other artists, filmmakers, curators, musicians and friends. Zach is also founder of Brooklyn’s monthly experimental music series, “Darmstadt: Classics of the Avant Garde” co-curated with Nick Hallett featuring leading local and international composers and improvisers, former co-curator of the PS1 warmup music series and curator at Issue Project Room. Zach has received grants from the Netherlands America Foundation, Turbulence, the Jerome Foundation, NYFA, Experimental Television Center, LEMURplex, Free103.9 AIRtime Fellowship, the Danish Council for Visual art, the City of Copenhagen Artist in Residence Program and is a graduate of the Oberlin Conservatory and the Interactive Telecommunications Program and has taught at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, Bard High School Early College and Bloomfield College.