Gryphon Rue is a composer-performer, songwriter, and curator in the field of audiovisual culture whose work spans electroacoustic music and multimedia projects. Rue is currently working on his first book, Strange Attractor (Inventory Press, fall 2019).
He performs in the duo Rue Bainbridge with frequent collaborator Benton C Bainbridge.
Works internationally
Based in Brooklyn, NY
Write to me: gryphonrue@gmail.com
EDUCATION
2018. Masters in Creative Practice, Goldsmiths, University of London
Recipient of International Student Scholarship
Graduate of Audio Engineering Program
2011. Bachelor of Arts in Electronic Music, Bard College
PRIZES
2019. Recipient of the inaugural Nam Jun Paik and Shigeko Kubota Video Art Prize (As Rue Bainbridge)
DISCOGRAPHY
2019. Music for Singing Saw, Soap Library (forthcoming)
2019. Vertical Foliage, Love is a Grasshopper Nearby LP (forthcoming)
2018. Google Portrait (ft. Christine Sun Kim & Dean Wareham), single, Tigersushi Records
2017. GR1: Parity mix, Hartzine
2016. Google Portrait EP ft. Joakim, Tigersushi Records
2015. Guilt Vacation LP, El Tryptophan, self-released, vinyl distributed by Wharf Cat Records
2012. Good mourning, Short companions EP, collaboration with Dean Wareham and Britta Phillips,
self-released
2005. Peyos and the Plastic Mohawk EP, produced by Jason Rabinowitz with The Bloodsugars, self-released
GUEST APPEARANCES
2019. Eliot Krimsky, Wave in Time LP, (singing saw), Pretty Purgatory
2018. Dean Wareham Vs. Cheval Sombre LP, (singing saw), Gotta Groove
2016. High Water, Crush LP, (lyrics and guitars), Other People
2012. Odetta Hartman, Tally Marks EP, (singing saw), self-released
2009. Peter Yarrow, Day Is Done children’s book, (vocals), Sterling Publishing
SOUNDTRACKS
2018. Gropius Memory Palace, Ben Thorp Brown, 2017, 4K Video, 5.1 Sound,
20:17, World Premiere: Saint Louis Art Museum, European Premiere: International Film Festival Rotterdam, North American Premiere:
New York Film Festival
2018. Video trailer for Calder: Nonspace, Hauser & Wirth Los Angeles
2016. My Art, Laurie Simmons (composed by Will Epstein), electric guitar, World
Premiere: Venice International Film Festival, North American Premiere: Tribeca Film Festival
2012. Alexander Calder’s Mobiles: Eucalyptus (1940),
Black Mobile with Hole (1954), Bosquet is the Best Best (1946). Calder
Foundation website, filmed by King & Partners
CURATORIAL PROJECTS
2017. Symbol Rush, Curator. Clayton Gallery and Outlaw Art Museum, New York
2017. Strange Attractor, Curator. Ballroom Marfa, Marfa, TX
2016. The Sump (now H0L0) performance space, Cocurator. New York
2016. Two performances of Earle Brown’s Calder Piece, 1963–66, Curator. Calder
Foundation, Earle Brown Foundation, Talujon Percussion Quartet, Friends Seminary, New York
2015. Eureka, Curator of music installations. Pace Gallery, New York
2015. #GauguinSounds, Ghost author. Fondation Beyeler, Basel
2013. They might well have been
remnants of the boat, Cocurator. Calder Foundation, The High Line Hotel, New York
2012. Oh, you mean cellophane and
all that crap, Cocurator. Calder Foundation, The Mckittrick Hotel, New York
PUBLICATIONS
2019. “Strange Attractor,” Inventory Press and Ballroom Marfa (Forthcoming)
2018. “Storm Tracker” in Dis-assemb-blies 08, Will Work For Good
2018. “Calder y el sonido”, in Alexander Calder: Teatro de Encuentros, Fundación PROA, Buenos Aires (exhibition catalogue)
2014. “PostcART: Jay Miriam” Contemporary Lynx
2013. “Calder and Sound,” in Alexander Calder: Avant-Garde in Motion, Düsseldorf: Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen (exhibition
catalogue)
VIDEO ART
2018. LICENSE, with Robert Buck, 11:50 min, color, stereo sound, distributed by Electronic Arts Intermix, New York
2018. Google Portrait, with Benton C Bainbridge, Series of Digital Media HD videos in Singular Editions, silent, running times vary
MUSIC VIDEOS
2018. Google Portrait (ft. Christine Sun Kim & Dean Wareham), 4:20 min, color, stereo sound
2016. Google Portrait (ft. Joakim), directed by Benton C Bainbridge, edited by Ian Holden & Gryphon Rue, 4:20 min, color, stereo sound, Digital Media HD video
2016. Beethoven for Relaxation, directed by Max Grey, 2:58, color, stereo sound, Digital Media HD video
2016. Insect Express, directed by Emily Pelstring, 3:25, color, stereo sound, Digital Media HD video, Ottawa International Animation Festival (honorable mention for Best Canadian Animation). Read about Insect Express at Animation World Network
PRESENTATIONS
2018. “Calder and Sound,” Alexander Calder: Radical Inventor, Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
2018. Center for Visual Music Symposium, Sonoma State University, Rue Bainbridge: Artists-in-Residence, Public Works Department / Governors Island, New York
2018. Reading Session for Scores, Gaudeamus Muziekweek, Trash Panda Collective + Igor Silva, Utrecht
2013. “Calder and Sound,” Avant-Garde in Motion, Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf
GROUPS
2017-Current. Rue Bainbridge, singing saw, overtone singing, electro-acoustic improvisation and interactive video synthesizer objects, with Benton C Bainbridge
2017-Current. Vertical Foliage, overtone singing and singing saw, with Heloise Tunstall Behrens
2011. Odetta and Gryphon, folk duo with Odetta Bess Hartman
2007-2008. Sediment Club, founding member & drummer
FESTIVALS
2017. Take Off Festival with Wouter van Reek (Keepvogel), Amsterdam
2016. Festival Hongerige Wolf, Groningen
2014. i = u festival, New York
2012. Phoenicia International Festival of the Voice, Phoenicia, New York
SELECT PERFORMANCES
2019. Hauser & Wirth presents Rue Bainbridge, Los Angeles
2018. Shigeko Kubota Foundation presents Rue Bainbridge, New York
2018. Slate Projects presents Rue Bainbridge, The Averard Hotel, London
2015. Clayton Patterson: “Outside In” with paintings by Elsa Rensaa, Howl Happening, New York
2015. Lead performer, LYFE™ by Glass Ghost, co-presented by the David Rubenstein Atrium at Lincoln Center and Performance Space 122, New York
2013. Ensemble piece Vertical Foliage Orchestra, ft. Aaron Moore (Volcano the Bear), Alejandro Antelo- Suarez, Anthony Kingsley, in They might well have been remnants of the boat, Calder Foundation, The High Line Hotel, New York
2012. Ensemble piece Playing The Beetles, ft. Dave Nuss (NNCK), Gabrielle Herbst (GABI), Daniel Fishkin, Odetta Hartman, in Oh, you mean cellophane and all that crap, Calder Foundation, The Mckittrick Hotel, New York
2011. Maybe I Should Have Called it ‘My Life in Nineteen Minutes’, Calder Foundation and Lower Manhattan Cultural Council in association with AIR, Art International and the Clocktower Gallery, New York
2011. Borderlines: Not a Manifesto but an Apparition, Senior Thesis Concert I & II, Bard College, New York
2011. USA Wanderlust Tour as folk duo Odetta and Gryphon, with Odetta Bess Hartman
2008. Featured vocalist, Marina Rosenfeld’s Teenage Lontano, Whitney Biennial
2008. June Concert and Awareness Tour, Vietnamese cities and provinces with Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul and Mary, to raise awareness for victims of AGENT ORANGE, performing on HTV9
ARTISTS RESIDENCIES
2017. Public Works Department, Governor’s Island, New York
2016. NDSM Treehouse, Amsterdam
COLLABORATIONS
2018. Sharon Gal, Feel the Noise, for large ensemble of electric guitars
2014. Busy Day, Christine Sun Kim & Thomas Benno, Droit de Cités
2014. Performer, BOY SHOW by Allison Brainard, Dark Night Theater Festival, 14th street YMCA, New York
1997. Saxophonist and dancer, Gail Gilbert, Folding Time, Thread Waxing Space, New York
INSTALLATIONS
2018. Slate Projects presents Rue Bainbridge at The Averard Hotel, London
2013. Beethoven for Relaxation, in collaboration with sculptor Tom Smith, Delusions, Rox Gallery, New York
2011. Six Degrees of Degradation, Chapel of the Holy Innocents, Bard College, Annandale, New York
FILM APPEARANCES
2013. To Be Forever Wild, dir. David Becker
SHORT BIO
Gryphon Rue was born in New York City and raised in Woodstock, NY. He studied Recording Arts and Electronic Music at Bard College (BA, 2011) with Richard Teitelbaum, Marina Rosenfeld, Bob Bielecki, and Zeena Parkins. At Goldsmiths, University of London he studied Creative Practice (MA, 2018) with Iris Garrelfs, John Drever, Roger Redgate, John Harries, and Lisa Busby. He is advised by composer Rolf Gehlhaar.
Rue is a songwriter who also performs electroacoustic music, often in the duo Rue Bainbridge with media artist Benton C Bainbridge.
Rue Bainbridge intersect expanded cinema with improvised music in a dynamic response to specific sites and audiences. Rue Bainbridge are the recipients of the inaugural Nam Jun Paik and Shigeko Kubota Video Art Prize (2019). The project has been supported with residencies at spaces in transition: an Italianate palazzo that housed formerly wealthy seniors, an 18th century hotel favored by rock stars, and an officer’s house on a former military island. Rue Bainbridge have been presented by Hauser & Wirth, Slate Projects, Center for Visual Music, Public Works at Governor’s Island, Andrew Freedman Home, and Shigeko Kubota Video Art Foundation. Projects are realized as immersive audiovisual performances in custom installations, and yield single channel artworks with decentralized provenance.
Rue coproduced and co-curated the Calder Foundation’s 12-hour projects—continuous programming in non-traditional locations of cross-generational and cross-disciplinary works such as film, sound, static art installations and performance. 2013’s They Might Well Have Been Remnants of the Boat was presented in a neogothic refectory and featured works by artists such as Keith Rowe, Chris Corsano, Jack Goldstein, Christine Sun Kim, Sheila Hicks, Alejandro Guzman and Elka Krajewska vs. John Williams. The previous Oh, you mean cellophane and all that crap took place in a halted construction zone and featured works by artists such as Mary Ellen Bute, Alexandre Singh, C Spencer Yeh vs. Ikue Mori, Anri Sala, Darren Bader, Aki Sasamoto, and James Lee Byars.
Rue is currently working on Strange Attractor (Inventory Press, fall 2019). Strange Attractor explores the uncertainties and poetics of networks, environmental events, technology, and sound. The book begins with the premise that our lived experience and the intimacy, vastness, and interconnectedness of financial and psychological abstractions are intertwined yet irreconcilable. Expanding beyond its namesake exhibition at Ballroom Marfa in 2017, Strange Attractor features artworks by Lawrence Abu Hamdan, Thomas Ashcraft, Robert Buck, Alexander Calder, Beatrice Gibson, Phillipa Horan, Channa Horwitz, Lucky Dragons, Mark Lombardi, Herbert Matter, Haroon Mirza, Douglas Ross, Elias Sime and Iannis Xenakis. The works coalesce with conversations between tropical ecologist Merlin Sheldrake, novelist Chloe Aridjis and economic sociologist Juan Pablo Pardo-Guerra. Texts and poems punctuate the artworks, with notable contributions by media art historian Douglas Kahn and poet Bernadette Mayer.