The Brief
Deradoorian is a vocalist, multi-instrumentalist, and music producer. Her wide-ranging influences include East Indian, Middle Eastern, Native American, and traditional Japanese music. She is a member of Avey Tare’s Slasher Flicks and a former member of Dirty Projectors, and has also collaborated with The Roots, Flying Lotus, and Björk. Her first solo album, The Expanding Flower Planet, was released by Anticon in 2015.
Which film would you recommend to our readers?
Shaolin and Wu Tang, directed by Gordon Liu. The intimacy of all the fight scenes. The close-ups of hands precisely striking pressure points. It’s so artistic in its motion.
Which visual artworks would you recommend to our readers?
Brian DeGraw’s new works on Instagram. His abstract, fragmented portraits are like double exposure psychedelic ayahuasca visions.
Which fashion clothing line would you recommend to our readers?
69. It has the most interesting oversized denim pieces and fringe masks. It’s kind of like Issey Miyake meets Los Angeles.
Which works of photojournalism would you recommend to our readers?
Diana Markosian’s exceptional photographs of human life in the Caucasus and Eastern Europe. They capture the candid beauty of the people’s daily lives.
Perspectives
The following questions relate to our Perspectives column, in which two writers respond to an artwork that they are experiencing for the first time.
Can art erase history?
Art is the subjective experience of history. It doesn’t erase it, it just is.
Can children make art?
Children are art. The purest form of expression and creativity.
Can we empathise with inanimate objects?
If you are an animist, I think so. I have. It’s like an expansion of your awareness of everything around you – to try to imagine being something you could never be.
Could art end civilisation?
No. Art is your dedication to life. It’s what carries people through generation to generation. It is the positive facet of civilisation.
Do some art forms capture fleeting moments better than others?
I think music does in pop culture, in that it reflects the current consciousness of humans in three minutes. Music changes quickly.
Should art aim to bring people together?
That is one of my aims, but I don't think that has to be the aim. Art is an outlet, a manoeuvring through one's own inner experience.
States of the Arts
The following questions relate to our States of the Arts column, for which each article includes four artworks that share an association with a single nation or territory.
Which Syrian artworks would you recommend to our readers?
Safwan Dahoul’s dream-inspired, Cubist-like paintings of a woman experiencing and expressing the confinement and struggles felt in times of crisis. The works are smooth in texture, and often monochromatic.
The art of discovery
The following questions relate to Silent Frame’s aim to celebrate the art of discovery.
What does discovery mean to you?
Knowledge. Tapping into the collective unconscious and realising you are a thread in the fabric of artistic expression.
What question would you like to ask other Silent Frame interviewees?
What’s the most important ritual or practice you must do in order to create?
More to discover
Deradoorian: Visit Deradoorian's Soundcloud page here. Listen to The Expanding Flower Planet on Bandcamp here. Watch a live performance of 'A Beautiful Woman' here, and a full live set for KEXP here.
J. L. Sirisuk has interviewed Deradoorian for Interview Magazine, as have Paula Mejia for Rolling Stone and Colin Joyce for SPIN. Find an RBMA roundtable featuring Deradoorian, Lucrecia Dalt, and tUnE-yArDs' Merrill Garbus here.
Today's recommendations: Shaolin and Wu Tang (opening), Brian DeGraw (Instagram page), 69 (website), Diana Markosian (website), Safwan Dahoul (profile on Ayyam Gallery website).
Read more: Interviews with musicians
