Zen Cohen - Work Sample
Juan Jaula es John Cage, video, 40mins
Concept, original music and voiceover: Guillermo Galindo
Videography, editing and animation: Zen Cohen
Production dates: 2004 - 2015
Juan Jaula es John Cage is a non-traditional documentary about Mexican composer Guillermo Galindo’s confrontation of his musical heritage and education against taboos of the musical “avant-garde” by performing a John Cage score with a Mariachi band. The footage includes interviews with John Cage scholars and musicians, documentation of rehearsals and performances, as well as animations and found footage. The documentary and live performance with the Mariachi’s premiered at the deYOUNG Museum in July, 2015.
103 Shots, video, 2:36mins
Concept and Direction: Cassils
Videography and editing by Zen Cohen
"Following the recent mass shooting at Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, I was struck by the testimony of one of the survivors, a man who said one of the reasons he did not react immediately to the gunshots was that he initially perceived them as first as the celebratory noises of “fireworks or balloons popping.” I took this narrative as the starting point for 103 Shots, a short film shot at San Francisco Pride with the help of over 200 volunteers. Filmed in Dolores Park, the footage presents stark black and white imagery of a series of pairs of couples and friends bursting a balloon between their bodies with the pressure of an embrace; the soundtrack was created using foley recordings of balloons popping in a cement room." - Cassils: Artwork: 103 Shots
Coyolxāuhqui / Cōātlīcue, excerpt from The Gatekeepers, 7:21mins
2019
Director, camera, editing, installation design: Zen Cohen
Personas conceived and performed: Yunuen Rhi
Ceramic Armor: Adrián Martínez Alarzón
From 2015-2019, I collaborated with performance artists who identify as gender-fluid, queer, two-spirit or as "border crossers" to create an eco-mythological, multi-channel video and sound installation titled, The Gatekeepers. Each artist created visual performance personas based on the intersections of their own trans-cultural, political and spiritual identities. The culmination of this footage as an installation is an attempt to magnify and illuminate these personas; to create a mythology inhabited by new idols and archetypes wherein these personas, or gates, are seen as symbolic figures at the threshold between the human and non-human world. In each projection, the performers appear enacting rituals that merge body and land juxtaposed with layers of visual and auditory symbols. In other moments, the performers directly confront the viewer, staring towards the fourth wall. Through this convergence of projection and viewer, the intention is to initiate a remembrance that Nature is not something outside the Self but inherently linked to persona.
The focus of this excerpt is performance artist, Yunuen Rhi, who created two personas based on the Nahuatl mythologies of Coyolxāuhqui and Cōātlīcue.
Violeta in Elders Garden, excerpt from The Gatekeepers
Two-channel HD video with sound, 20:01 mins.
Production completed, 2019
Video by Zen Cohen made in collaboration with Violeta Luna
Exploded Frame (unbound artists’ book, WIP) digital prints on clear film, magnets. 9.5’ x 12’, 2021. Creative Consultant: Candida Pagan.
MaxMsp Puzzle, printed video stills mounted on acrylic and laser cut into jigsaw puzzles. Stills captured from moments where the video was performed using a camera and customized live video mixing using MaxMsp/Jitter. 12” x 16.5’’ /285 Pieces
VHS Puzzle, printed video still mounted on acrylic and laser cut into jigsaw puzzle with box. Still frame from the moment of an in-camera edit. 12” x 16.5’’ /285 Pieces
Untitled, projection map using Isadora onto folded yupo paper. Video: found footage, time-lapse performance, and an AI generated animation, 2023.
X_spectre, video installation, 2022
X_spectre in eco-tones, projection mapping using Isadora and mylar, 2023
Curatorial Project: Open Air Media Festival (OAMF) creates exhibition opportunities for media artists who live in Iowa and the greater Midwest region. Participating artists present projects ranging from site-specific installation, projection mapping, video, performance, sound, and radio-broadcasting in accessible, outdoor locations for art-seeking audiences and chance-engagement with a broad public. Iowa City has a long history of avant-garde media arts dating back to the 1960s from the University of Iowa’s Intermedia program to a thriving contemporary arts scene today. OAMF is the only large-scale media-arts event in Eastern Iowa and provides space for media-artists and arts-enthusiasts to connect, thereby strengthening the regional media-arts community.
This work sample highlights selected projects from the last three years of festival programming. For more information: publicspaceone.com/openair