Kirili in Dialogue with
Ned Rothenberg
Ned Rothenberg at Alain Kirili’ Studio, Roulette Concert, 2021
(Photo © Ariane Lopez-Huici )
“Alain Kirili was a man with a passionate appetite for the extraordinary
(add charming French accent here), whether it might be found at home in Paris or New York or far away in a place like Bamako. He was a huge fan of creative music and saw a multiplicity of parallel lines in the creative processes of musical improvisors and visual artists.
He used the phrase “free jazz” enthusiastically, a term much less culturally loaded for Europeans than Americans like me; for him it emphasized freedom to experiment and work outside accepted norms.”
Ned Rothenberg
In Memoriam - A Tribute to Alain Kirili (1946–2021)
Edited by Carter Ratcliff and Robert C. Morgan , Published in the Brooklyn Rail, nov 2021
Ned Rothenberg, White Street Studio, 2017
top : Alain Kirili introduces Ned Rothenberg (solo), White Street Studio, 2015
bottom left : Evan Parker & Ned Rothenberg, White Street Studio, 2019
bottom right : Ned Rothenberg and Indian Musicians, White Street Studio, 2016
( Photos © Ariane Lopez-Huici )
Ned Rothenberg and Indian Musicians, White Street Studio, 2016
“ Alain and I puzzled over trying to figure out when we met. I think it was during the ’80s when I often played at the Alternative Museum, which was located on the ground floor of Ariane and Alain’s building. Wherever it started, our relationship grew much stronger in the last five years of his life and I was so happy to be able to collaborate with him on what—in a way—may have been his last performance, where he made beautiful brush paintings while I played in his loft, surrounded by his sculptures. It was all captured by a marvelous production team from Roulette and is available here. The production also recalls many of the wonderful evenings of music that were hosted there by Ariane and Alain with a live audience of fellow artists.”
Ned Rothenberg
In Memoriam - A Tribute to Alain Kirili (1946–2021)
Edited by Carter Ratcliff and Robert C. Morgan , Published in the Brooklyn Rail, nov 2021
A Concert without Public
Ned Rothenberg, Alain Kirili and Ariane Lopez-Huici
White Street Studio, 2021
Roulette is honored to stream an intimate concert by acclaimed musician Ned Rothenberg filmed in the downtown Manhattan studio of artists Alain Kirili and Ariane Lopez-Huici. Closed to the public and existing without an audience, the performance creates a unique dialog between Kirili’s sculptures & drawings and Rothenberg’s playing.
Ned Rothenberg: alto sax, clarinet, shakuhachi
Alain Kirili : sculpture and drawing
Ariane Lopez-Huici : photography
A Concert without Public : Ned Rothenberg, Alain Kirili and Ariane Lopez-Huici, White Street Studio , 2021
(photos & videos © Ariane Lopez-Huici)
Alain Kirili, Hey Ned I, II, III, IV, 2021
A Concert without Public : Ned Rothenberg, Alain Kirili and Ariane Lopez-Huici
White Street Studio, 2021
(photos & videos © Ariane Lopez-Huici)
Opening of Alain Kirili’ Tribute Show
at the Slag/RX Gallery, Chelsea, New York, 2022
with Maria Mitchell and Ned Rothenberg
Opening of Alain Kirili’ Tribute Show at the Slag/RX Gallery, Chelsea, New York, 2022
with Maria Mitchell and Ned Rothenberg
(photos/videos © Ariane Lopez-Huici & Marilia Destot)
“So often the various artistic disciplines of art have been forced further apart by the differing economic realities of the worlds of music, performance, and visual art. Alain was a great spokesperson for the idea that all these things are an expression of a common aesthetic enterprise and need no segregation. Performances in his loft always had a wonderfully mixed audience of painters, sculptors, critics, poets, choreographers, and of course musicians. It really felt like a magic space of creation.
I feel Alain most wanted to create fertile ground, both for his own creative inspiration and to engender a broad sense of community with his fellow artists. "
Ned Rothenberg
In Memoriam - A Tribute to Alain Kirili (1946–2021)
Edited by Carter Ratcliff and Robert C. Morgan , Published in the Brooklyn Rail, nov 2021