Join us for a series of performances with and around the Auerglass Organ, a two-person collaborative pump organ conceived by Tauba Auerbach and musician Cameron Mesirow (professionally known as Glasser). The Auerglass, whose title combines the artists’ names, depends on trust and coordination to operate and expands upon key interdisciplinary themes and concepts from the exhibition Tauba Auerbach — S v Z. The instrument cannot be played by a single person, as each player relies on the other to pump air into their pipes. The two sides of the instrument are just shy of symmetrical — a single keyboard is divided between them in alternating notes.

On March 10 and 11, Auerbach and Mesirow will play compositions on the Auerglass; physicist Hideo Mabuchi will give a talk entitled Disjunction that deconstructs the opposition of art versus science in relation to Auerbach’s work; and composer and artist Meara O’Reilly and musician Olga Bell will perform vocal arrangements based on the practice of hocketing, which splits a melody across multiple parts, often in surprising ways.

Throughout the run of the exhibition, students and alumni from Mills College, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and San Francisco State University will compose music for the Auerglass Organ. These original compositions will be practiced intermittently during public hours and performed in a culminating event on April 28.

Header image: Tauba Auerbach in collaboration with Cameron Mesirow, A.K.A. Glasser, Auerglass Organ, 2009 (installation view, SFMOMA); collection of the artist; © Tauba Auerbach; photo: Matthew Millman