Impossible Music

A survey of the sonic vanguard, Impossible Music brings together sculptures, sounds, scores, video, and live performances to explore the radical, interdisciplinary potential of conceptual and experimental music. The group exhibition features work across mediums by boundary-defying composers, artists, and collectives including Terry Adkins, Black Quantum Futurism, Nikita Gale, Sarah Hennies, Tom Johnson, Christine Sun Kim, Conlon Nancarrow, Aki Onda, and C. Spencer Yeh.

This exhibition calls attention to the transformative power of sound as a tool for social change, innovation, and empowerment. From the banned to the bombastic, Impossible Music highlights the work of visionary artists who pushed music forward, defying norms and piloting new forms of expression.

Impossible Music will also present a record listening station with underground recordings of songs rendered illegal under Potlatch Bans, which outlawed Native North American ceremonies in the United States and Canada.

Shown together, the works in the exhibition address the complexity of music and moments in human history that led to the creation of new sounds, including the sound of resistance.

Impossible Music is curated by Candice Hopkins and Raven Chacon and organized by the ICA Pittsburgh (formerly Miller ICA), Pittsburgh. Organized at TUAG by Dina Deitsch.

Generous support for TUAG programming is provided by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

Image: Nikita Gale, MARMI, 2022. Courtesy of the Artist and Petzel Gallery, New York.