Jazz Musician Jason Moran Completes Experimental Artist Residency at RISD

Jazz pianist, composer and educator Jason Moran works primarily in the realm of sound, but he has been delving into the visual arts for more than 20 years, collaborating with a number of artists, including widely recognized RISD alums Julie Mehretu MFA 97 PT/PR and Kara Walker MFA 94 PT/PR, and presenting abstract paintings at a 2022 MASS MoCA exhibition called Black Stars: Writing in the Dark. So, his yen to work with current students as part of an experimental artist residency in RISD’s Film/Animation/Video department seemed like a logical next step. 

“Much of Jason’s career has been about collaboration and improvisation—thinking about how to stretch his own relationship with music,” FAV Department Head Sheri Wills explains. “When we started talking about developing a residency at RISD, the goal was to push the boundaries of the art studio in an open-minded way.”

Moran is drawn to the work of other jazz musicians whose creative paths cross into the visual, like Louis Armstrong. The seminal trumpeter was also a prolific collage artist who used photographs, letters and promotional materials to create art that contemporary listeners can still enjoy in the Louis Armstrong House Museum in Queens, NY. “Shadow, color and line are important facets of both visual art and music,” Moran notes.

Last fall, Moran joined the RISD community by presenting a series of workshops and participating in a class led by Assistant Professor Africanus Okokon 13 FAV called Time, Light and Sound. The course fosters a space for new perspectives, counter-histories, narratives and abstractions to emerge in the context of cinema. Moran took on the role of inquisitor, sound consultant and mentor.

Okokon compares Moran’s nascent artist residency to jazz. “It evolves organically but not from nowhere,” he says, “not from divine inspiration. It comes from deep knowledge, but it happens in the moment.”

Moran also worked closely with Assistant Professor Laine Rettmer—who teaches in both the FAV and Photography departments—and the FAV seniors in the department’s Open Media track. The year-long program allows students to explore time-based media in nontraditional, cross-disciplinary ways, such as through installation, performance and public art. “Connecting with Jason has been inspiring and generative,” Rettmer says. “I think his direction and mere presence on campus has led students to connect through music in ways I haven’t seen before.”

Moran recently joined Rettmer in RISD’s Woods-Gerry Gallery to discuss work on view as part of the multimedia Sculpture and Open Media Senior Show just before the exhibition closed. The informal crit focused on pieces by seniors Max Doulis 25 FAV, Alex Ferrandiz 25 FAV, Loki Peng 25 FAV and Silvy Zhou 25 FAV.

Doulis had two related pieces in the show: a boxy wooden chair hanging precariously from the gnarled branch of a tree and a little wooden table half-swallowed by a black, thorny vine. “Is the vine attacking the table or protecting it?” Moran asked. “I wanted it to be ambiguous,” the artist responded. Rettmer found “beauty in the balance,” and Zhou described the installation as “a fantastical world where the tree is delighted with the chair, and the material it was made from is a sacred gift from nature.”

Ferrandiz also created multiple related pieces for the show, all loosely based on his senior film in progress. “In a way, I’m trying to create a conversation between the past and the present,” he said, “and I wanted there to be an element of discovery for the viewer.”

The intervention connects two rooms in the gallery, with silent video playing in one room and the related audio emanating from an industrial pipe next door, activated via a large yellow button. Moran said the piece reminded him of an experience he had years ago watching musicians through the windows of a jazz club and hearing the music through a vent in the side of the building. “The sound is uncontainable,” he said. “And I appreciate the fact that it’s hard to make out the words. You feel the conversation and the laughter.”

Simone Solondz / photos by Kaylee Pugliese
May 1, 2025