Gabriela Vainsencher and Daniel Fox
The François Vase

October, 2013

While Parker's Box is in the process of finding a new space and reinventing ourselves, we are thrilled to join forces with Soapbox gallery in order to present visual artist Gabriela Vainsencher and composer Daniel Fox's latest joint endeavor, The François Vase.

Vainsencher's video, featuring the Philadelphia-based Green Chair Dance Group, retells the ancient Greek myth of the Minotaur in the labyrinth from the Minotaur's perspective, using dance and subtitled text. The score, written by Fox for the Momenta Quartet, explores the spatial fragmentation of contrapuntal textures. Watch the trailer HERE.

This one-night event will open with a short lecture by recent Guggenheim Fellow art historian Guy Hedreen on the actual François Vase, followed by the screening and live performance and ending with a reception for the artists and performers.

Location: note that this performance will not take place at our usual location, but at SoapBox Gallery, 636 Dean St., Brooklyn, NY 11238

Gabriela Vainsencher is an Argentinean-born Israeli artist living and working in Brooklyn. Her drawings, installations, and videos have been shown in the US and abroad, including a 2012 two-person exhibition at the Musée d'Art Moderne, Le Havre, France, who added Vainsencher's video, Reconstruction, to their collection.

Recent solo exhibitions include Recession Art, NY and La Chambre Blanche, Quebec City. Her work has been included in group shows at The Freies Museum, Berlin, The National Gallery of Saskatchewan, Canada, the Dumbo Arts Festival, Pierogi and Parker’s Box in Brooklyn. Gabriela has participated in artist residencies including Yaddo, The Atlantic Center for the Arts, Triangle Arts Association (all US) and La Chambre Blanche (Canada). She is the founder of the Morning Drawing Residency, writes about art for Title Magazine and The Huffington Post, and occasionally teaches art at Williams College, in Williamstown, MA. Gabriela will enter the MFA program at Hunter College in January 2014.

Daniel Fox's compositions have been described as “strongly imagined” and “driven by propulsive counterpoint” (Alex Ross, The New Yorker). In 2013 he received the Presser Award to collaborate with the visual artist Gabriela Vainsencher on The François Vase. Fox also recorded piano improvisations for Vainsencher’s limited edition video, Reconstruction, which premiered at the Musée d’Art Moderne André Malraux, Le Havre, France.

Fox was born and raised outside of Philadelphia. He received a PhD (2005) in Mathematics from Duke University. After receiving his PhD he studied flamenco guitar in Seville with Juan del Gastor. He was a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Mathematics Department at UC Irvine and a National Science Foundation International Research Fellow at Oxford University. His mathematical research focuses on calibrated geometry and integrable systems. He has studied composition with Phillip Cooke, Andrew McPherson, Maurice Wright, and Jan Krzywicki.

He is currently studying composition at Boyer College of Music and Dance at Temple University and is an Assistant Professor in the Mathematics Department at the Community College of Philadelphia.