Richard Lerman
Richard Lerman (1944) is sound artist and performance artist. He has created electronic music and interdisciplinary art since the 1960’s offering performances, installations and screenings in North and South America, Asia, Europe, Australia and New Zealand. He has collaborated with John Cage and David Tudor. At Brandeis College he studied with Alvin Lucier, Gordon Mumma, and David Tudor. Lerman gained an interest in sound art in the early 60s. He soon met John Cage, who opened the door to observing sounds and electroacoustic music. Lerman’s work involves a variety of tools to achieve the sound he wants. He uses carbon fiber rods, piezoelectric devices that can capture the vibrations of sounds, hydrophones to get sounds underwater and many more. For 40 years, his work has often utilized piezo disk and other transducers that he has designed and built. These pick up sounds too quiet for our ears, extending our hearing. His piece Travelon Gamelon (1978) for amplified bicycles has received hundreds of performances worldwide. In 2012 he premiered a sound/video installation From the Galapagos at cuba-cultur in Münster, Germany, and also install Death Valley Cycle. Lerman has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the Asian Cultural Council, the Arizona and Massachusetts Arts Councils, the NEA and many others. His films and video work have been screened widely, including seven super 8 films from his Transducer Series Pieces shown at the Museum of Modern Art. In 2007 a 2-CD set of earlier music and audio work, including Travelon Gamelon, was released on EM Records, Osaka, Japan. Since 1994 professor Lerman has taught at Arizona State University.