Jon Mueller, Tom Lecky, and Ryan Collins: “All Colors Present" at Rozz-Tox -- February 21 (pictured:Jon Mueller)
Friday, February 21, 8 p.m.
Rozz-Tox, 2108 Third Avenue, Rock Island IL
A special “sound and visual meditation” featuring artists in the realms of music, photography, and literature will unfold at Rozz-Tox on February 21 when the Rock Island venue hosts All Colors Present, an evening of aural and visual magic boasting co-headliners Jon Mueller and Tom Lecky and local poet and Midwest Writing Center director Ryan Collins.
As described at Rhythmplex.com, "Jon Mueller’s singular performance idiom is an awe-inspiring display of elegant athleticism, preternatural focus, brute restraint, and ecstatic, monastic reverie. Paired with Tom Lecky's photographs, it becomes a deliberate focus on form, shape and detail. It requires and demands a state of inner quietude from witnesses. Yet from this seemingly metronomic exercise blossoms every possible tint and hue of infinite spectral sound.
"Renowned percussionist and drummer Jon Mueller is celebrated for his uncommon technique, rigor and virtuosity. Mueller’s aim has been to move drums, percussion, and rhythm from its anticipated backbeat to a central musical focus, something more intuitive and natural than usually imagined. Audiences throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, Japan, and the United Kingdom have experienced this idiosyncratic point of view as, paradoxically, both ‘cathartic’ and ‘meditative.' Notable solo performances have taken place at the Guggenheim Museum, New Museum, Issue Project Room, SXSW, Big Ears Festival, Hopscotch Fest, and Witching Hour Festival. Beyond his solo work, Mueller has performed and recorded with Olivia Block, Aaron Turner, James Plotkin, Who is the Witness?, Mind Over Mirrors, Volcano Choir, Collections of Colonies of Bees and Pele."
At TomLecky.com, we learn that the artist "has worked in photography, music (as Hallock Hill), the book arts, prose and poetry writing, and literary criticism. His creative work concentrates on memory, place, and environment, the work of the imagination, perception, and the intersections of abstraction and representation. He often interweaves appropriated texts and images with his own, evoking a conversation with the history of book design and illustration.
"These creative pursuits are linked to Tom’s career as an internationally recognized expert in the field of rare and antiquarian books and manuscripts. He has worked in the auction world – notably in a 17-year run as a specialist and Head of Christie’s New York Books and Manuscripts Department – and as an advisor to collectors and institutions. He is the owner of Riverrun Books, and the founder of the rare book and manuscript appraisal and advisory firm Lecky Art Group."
Midwest Writing Center director Collins, meanwhile, will read from the new project CALLING DOWN THE MOON, a series of improvised poems written during the 2024 Feed Me Weird Things FeaST in Iowa City and dedicated to the memory of Chris Wiersema (1980-2024). Collins is the author of A New American Field Guide & Song Book and several chapbooks. Recently, he was a finalist in the Omnidawn Poetry Chapbook Contest, the DIAGRAM/New Michigan Press Chapbook Contest, and the Conduit/Minds on Fire Open Book Prize. His work has appeared in Apartment, Crazyhorse, The Mixtape Review, Ninth Letter, Past Ten, Sink Review, and many other places. He hosts the SPECTRA Reading Series in Rock Island, Illinois, where he lives.
The February 21 Rozz-Tox event is a presentation of OUTLETProgramme, a nonprofit (501c3) arts & culture community interest project that focuses on presenting sound artists, DJs, experimental, avant-garde, electronic, and international artists.
Jon Mueller, Tom Lecky, and Ryan Collins will bring All Colors Present to the Rock Island venue on February 21, admission to the 8 p.m. event is $10 at the door (cash only), and more information is available by calling (309)200-0978 and visiting RozzTox.com.
