Spotlight on the Arts: The Intersection of Art and Welding

When an art museum commissions a piece celebrating construction work, it's not surprising that an e-cello is involved. 

Ken Steen and Gene Gort, both professors at the University of Hartford and Artists in Residence at I-Park in East Haddam, talk about their new collaboration with the New Britain Museum of American Art (NBMAA) in this Spotlight on the Arts segment. 

Steen, a composer and sound artist, described the origins of Reliquary of Labor, saying "NBMAA was building a new facility [and] we were commissioned to write a piece to commemorate the building of that new facility. We wanted to capture the construction process in sound, in photographic image, in video image and then turn that into a performance piece." 

The two men used the motions of construction workers as inspiration for their piece. Their partnership also serves as inspiration as well. Gort says, "Our collaboration is pretty remarkable in that we don't know what's going to happen. And it's a sort of 'what if' circumstance...a process of discovery.'"

Steen and Gort strive to technology integrate technology into their performances in innovative ways. Their latest collaboration, Each to Each, includes digital words, images and scenery. Gort says that "the technological push in a performance has to enhance the overall experience."