Biographies of SRS Artists/Producers/Directors

 

Millie Chen’s visual, audio and performative works are intended to interrupt habits of viewing. Materials and methodologies are contingent on the needs of the moment, but at the core of her projects are social inquiry and the use of sensory modes of perception. Her artwork has been shown across North America and in South America, East Asia and Europe at venues and festivals including the Buffalo AKG Art Museum (formerly Albright-Knox Art Gallery), Buffalo, The Power Plant, Toronto, Centre Culturel Canadien, Paris, Centro Nacional des las Artes, Mexico City, The Contemporary Austin, Shanghai Expo, Hong Kong Asian Film Festival, and FILE-Rio: Electronic Language International Festival, Rio de Janeiro. Her work is in several public collections including the Buffalo AKG, University of Colorado Art Museum, Art Bank of Canada Council for the Arts, Canadian Pacific Railway, and Toronto Transit Commission, and she has produced a number of permanent public art commissions. She most recently received media arts grants from both the Canada Council for the Arts and Ontario Arts Council, and a University at Buffalo Humanities Institute Faculty Research Fellowship; these awards are for her current collaborative project, SRS (Silk Road Songbook) https://www.silkroadsongbook.com. Her writing has appeared in publications in the U.K., Canada, the U.S. and China. Chen is a Professor in the Department of Art, University at Buffalo. https://www.milliechen.com/

Chen: CV

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Arzu Ozkal is a Turkish-born artist, designer, and researcher based in San Diego, California. Her work spans socially engaged design, contemporary art, and activism, with a deep commitment to collaboration and inclusivity. Ozkal has worked extensively with women in Turkey, Europe, and the U.S. to create platforms for social exchange and to examine the cultural conditions shaping women’s participation in contemporary society. She is the co-editor of Cabaret Voltaire: Fluxus West, San Diego, and Southern California Mail Art and Gün: Women’s Networks, and her projects have been exhibited internationally and are held in collections across the United States. Ozkal is a Professor of Graphic Design at San Diego State University. https://www.contrary.info/

Ozkal: CV
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Biographies of SRS Collaborators

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SRS Istanbul (Turkey)

 

Deniz Taşar, Vocalist, Composer, Lyricist, Performer

Deniz Taşar is an Istanbul based singer, songwriter, designer and a multidisciplinary artist, focusing mainly on contemporary jazz. With her distinctive vocal style and timbre, she creates songs that can be defined as personal, genre bending musical storytelling. She has performed in Turkey, Estonia, Venice, Germany and the U.S. Her debut album Uykuda Bir Bulut (2016) concentrates on the theme of struggle, improvising on Turkish jazz music, with all lyrics and music written by Taşar. She released her second solo album Pişman Olunmayan Dünler in 2021. The album evolves from jazz in its approach to arranging, performing and improvising, while incorporating elements of other genres such as indie pop, alternative rock, hip hop and electronic music. It tells the story of growing wiser and reasoning, showing different sides and the new direction of Taşar’s songwriting. She founded her record label SOLAS Records where she releases most of her music.

 

Adem Gülşen, Composer, Performer

Adem Gülşen graduated with Summa cum laude from Kocaeli University Faculty of Fine Arts with a degree in Piano in 2005. Following his graduation, he studied jazz theory with Elvan Araci (2005-2006), and improvisation and sound with Aydin Esen (2006-2009). He has been working on various musical projects for over fifteen years. Musicians he collaborated with include: Hüsnü Şenlendirici ( Hüsn’ü Dream) Birsen Tezer ( Eastern Standards) Ceylan Ertem, Jehan Barbur, Cenk Erdoğan, Şirin Soysal, Başak Yavuz, Kerem Türkaydın, Emre Tankal, Deniz Taşar, and Mehmet Ali Sanlıkol. Since 2008, Gülşen has participated in numerous jazz and music festivals. 

 

Baran Göksu, Recording Engineer

Bio forthcoming

 

Deniz Bankal, Cinematographer

Bio forthcoming

 

Alper Ekiz, Assistant

Bio forthcoming

 

Alev Ersan, Lyrics Translator

Alev Ersan is an artist, writer, and translator. Her practice ranges from installations incorporating audio/visual/textual content to stop-motion animation and poetry. Alev works with narrative and translation as tools/materials as well as modes of thinking through the porous relations between language, memory, and desire within private and public realms. Recent solo and collaborative work and publications include, Still in My Quotidian, De Appel, Amsterdam (2024) this contamination, and this crossroads, this accident here, DEPO, Istanbul (2023). Radiant Absence, Monograph for Füsün Onur, Istanbul/Milano (2022).

 

SRS Parkent (Uzbekistan)

 

Alexey Ulko, Location Director

Alexey Ulko, based in Samarkand and Tashkent, has been making experimental films since 2007 and is a curator of and writer about Central Asian contemporary art. Since 2003 Ulko has been working as a freelance consultant in English, Culture Studies and Art for the British Council and the International Institute for Central Asian Studies, and as a writer for Central Asian arts journals and online publications such as STILLS, Kazakhstan - Kyrgyzstan; Kurak, Kyrgyzstan; ARK, Uzbekistan; Moscow Art Journal, Russia. Ulko was one of the curators of the VideoART.uz festival of independent cinema in Tashkent. He is the author of over 40 articles about contemporary Central Asian art and culture and a book Uzbekistan Customs and Culture in the series Culture Smart! by Kuperard Publishers, UK (2016). Ulko is a member of the European Society for Central Asian Studies, the Association of Art Historians (UK) and the Central Eurasian Studies Society (USA).   

 

Feride Girgin, Vocalist

Feride Girgin sings in the style of jazz, avant-garde, ethno-jazz, folk, pop classics and neoclassics; she also performs her own compositions. Girgin was born in Tashkent but her family roots are in Crimea (the Crimean Tartars were brought to Uzbekistan in 1944 as a result of deportation by Stalin’s regime). Being half Crimean Tatar, half Turkish, Girgin absorbs the melody of these two cultures into her music and vocal interpretations.

N.B. Complete bio forthcoming

 

Vadim Shvedchikov, Horn Player

Vadim Shvedchikov is a Tashkent-born classical musician who was Principal horn of Shanghai Opera House, Guiyang Symphony Orchestra and National Symphony Orchestra of Uzbekistan. Shvedchikov received an Honours Bachelor of Music degree in Horn Performance on Full-scholarship from Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music, National University of Singapore, and received a ‘Musician of the Year’ (2016) award from the Guiyang Symphony Orchestra. His solo debut with the Guiyang Symphony was in May 2017 where he performed a Gliere Horn Concerto under the baton of maestro Dorian Wilson. Vadim has participated in numerous performances with different orchestras and ensembles such as Nurnberg Symphony Orchestra, Singapore Symphony Orchestra, Suzhou Symphony Orchestra, Metropolitan Festival Orchestra, London Sinfonietta, Orchestre des Champs-Elysees, Boston Brass, and Imani Winds. He has worked with a number of renowned conductors such as Franz Welser-Möst, Gabor Takacs-Nagy, Eiji Oue, Robert Spano, Tito Munoz, and Mark Wigglesworth.

 

Ashot Danielyan, Percussionist, Recording Engineer

Musician, poet and performing artist Ashot Danielyan is founder and songwriter of the Tashkent band Origami Wings, and co-founder of Ilkhom Rock Fest, one of the oldest music festivals in Uzbekistan. Since 2000 he has produced 2 LP albums and 5 singles, and toured in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Japan. Danielyan was the 2018 winner of the Goethe Poetry Slam competition in Tashkent. He is actively engaged as an author and creative producer in cross-cultural multidisciplinary projects that address social and environmental issues and support creative youth. His solo and collaborative works have been staged at Ilkhom Theatre, Navai Opera and Ballet Theatre in Tashkent and several art galleries in Tashkent, Kiev and Minsk. Danielyan is the recipient of international arts fellowships at Portland Institute for Contemporary Art (PICA) and other cultural and educational institutions in Seattle, San Francisco and Chicago.

 

Umida Akhmedova, Cinematographer

Uzbek photographer, filmmaker and photojournalist Umida Tukhtamuradovna Akhmedova, born in Parkent and based in Tashkent, is well-known for her commitment to social activism focused on human rights in Uzbekistan. She integrates this critical perspective into her creative work, which has led to political persecution within her country. In 2016, Akhemedova was awarded a Václav Havel International Prize for Creative Dissent. Umida graduated from the Soviet State Institute of Cinematography in Moscow in 1986. Since 2001, her works have been published in several books and photo albums in Uzbekistan, and her exhibitions include shows in Tbilisi, Georgia (2003, 2005), Copenhagen, Denmark (2006), and St. Petersburg, Russia (2008). In 2004, Umida was awarded a Grand Prix in the Press Photo Russia contest. As an Associated Press photographer, her images have been published by The New York Times, Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail. For SRS Parkent, Akhmedova was key in selecting the recording location and choice of poetic line for the lyric.

 

Cho'lpon, Lyric

Uzbek poet Cho’lpon (Abdulhamid Sulaymon oʻgʻli Yunusov) was a poet, playwright, novelist and literary translator. Born in 1897 in Andijan, he became one of Central Asia’s most influential writers in the 1920s and 1930s, greatly impacting other Uzbek writers. His pessimistic poetry, association with nationalist groups, and criticism of Soviet power made him a political target. After denunciations following the 1936 publication of his novel, Night and Day, Cho’lpon was arrested. In 1938, Cho’lpon was executed by the Soviets during the Great Purge.

 

Chris Fort, Lyrics Translator

Chris Fort is Assistant Professor of General Education at American University of Central Asia in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. She earned her PhD in Slavic Languages and Literatures in 2019 from University of Michigan. She has published on Russian and Central Asian literature of the 19th to 21st centuries and is the translator of several works of poetry and prose from Uzbek into English.

 

SRS Kangle (China)

 

Mengmeng Wang, Location Director

Based in Xi’an, Curator Wang Mengmeng is a Professor and Director of the Department of Transmedia Art at Xi’an Academy of Fine Arts. She holds a Doctorate in contemporary art criticism, and has published several books, as well as articles for publications such as New Art, Art Research, Art Observation, Art Monthly, and Contemporary Artists. She is also a nominator for China’s “Second Circle Art Youth Award,” “Fourth Ivy League Plan,” “Rising New Stars,” and other exhibitions concerning young artists. As an independent curator of numerous contemporary art exhibitions, she has worked with many art institutions including the National Art Museum of China, Beijing, OCAT Contemporary Terminal Xi’an, Xi’an Contemporary Art Museum, Sichuan Fine Arts Institute Art Museum, Salt Spring Island, Canada, and The Minories Galleries, UK.

 

Junfang Zhang, Vocalist, Lyrics Improviser

Junfang Zhang is from a rural area in Kangle County in Gansu Province, China. Formerly a cattle herder, she now works at a restaurant where she sings Hua’er (which she defines as only a hobby) to customers. She lost her parents at a very young age. She is divorced and has a son who lives with a different family. While Junfang Zhang encounters some resistance to singing Hua’er in public because of the inevitable interaction with male audience members, she shared with the SRS Kangle team, “Both my son and daughter are very supportive. They say my singing is good and I can earn money through Hua’er. My mom sings well. My mom earns money by singing Hua’er, too. I earn money by singing Hua’er for a private company during evening shifts every night. I have sung here for four years. This way, my son will be able to get married.”

 

Mei Yang, Vocalist, Lyrics Improviser

Mei Yang is from the agrarian community of Kangle in Gansu Province, China. She is a farmer, Hua’er singer, and temporary restaurant performer.

 

thruoutin (Brad M. Seippel), Pipa Player

American-born electronic producer, DJ, and multi-instrumentalist, thruoutin, has been based in China since 2009. His work varies from project to project but often combines different genres, focusing on organic and digital sounds. As a DJ, thruoutin showcases music that influences him as a producer including left-field club genres that float around footwork, gqom, bass music, amapiano, deconstructed club, and ambient music. He has toured extensively across North America, Europe, and Asia, and released music on various labels. Recently, he collaborated with Chengdu's New Noise, Shanghai's Play Rec, and zaaang, as well as international labels like Aud-Art, Silence.epi, and The Fourth Wind Records. He has also performed on Boiler Room China and at festivals such as the Wuzhen Theatre Festival and Chunyou. The musical works of thruoutin are best listened to on Bandcamp, which has a comprehensive collection of EPs, splits, and albums. Recommended releases: Ghost Lineage (New Noise) and Perseverance Selects feat. Abbe Shushu.

 

YaQian Zhang, Local Guide, Dialect Translator

YaQian Zhang was born in May 1977 in Gansu Province. In 2009, he graduated from the Department of Printmaking, Xi’an Academy of Fine Arts, acquiring a master’s degree. In the same year, he stayed at the school to become a teacher. He currently teaches in the Department of Experimental Art. He is a doctoral candidate in the research of art history and artistic creation, mainly engaged in the teaching and practice of contemporary art. Now he lives and works in Xi’an.

 

Qi Shen, Recording Engineer, Curatorial Assistant

Qi Shen was born in Xi’an, China and is a conceptual artist who graduated from the San Francisco Art Institute in 2020. Her practice spans text, painting, and installation, centering on themes of emotional unpredictability, the collapse and reconfiguration of order, and the exploration of fluid balance through deconstructing binary oppositions such as rationality and sensibility. 

 

Tong Niu, Cinematographer

Tong Niu, born in Nanjing, China, is a photographer and director whose practice spans film, installation, and text. His works have been shortlisted for prestigious awards such as the Leica Oskar Barnack Award. With a long-term focus on the essence of space and issues related to urbanization, his creations explore the interplay between human environments and the evolving urban landscape.

 

Fanghai Yin, Lyrics Translator

Fanghai Yin is a neurodivergent person born and raised in China. Before immigrating to the United States to pursue higher education, she worked as a singer-songwriter and model. Yin currently runs an alternative art space for emerging international women artists and their immediate communities in New York City while translating projects in the legal and cultural sectors. Her research focuses on the commodification of intimacy, with topics ranging from the post-pandemic sex industry to upward social mobility for immigrant cultural workers and user experience in Asian-centric entertainment activities. 

 

SRS Chubar (Iran)

 

Baran Ehsaei, Vocalist, Composer (AKA Faunoos)

Faunoos (the experimental persona of Baran Ehsaei) is an Iranian musician and performer, born and based in Tehran. She started her music journey playing classical piano, quickly developing a passion for jazz and discovering her voice by singing alongside her piano. The piano continues to be an inseparable part of her music as well as her life. She was a teenager when she became interested in theatre, receiving her BA in playwriting, and composing several film and theatre scores since then. At the moment, Ehsaei is studying music performance and composition at CalArts, in search of her authentic voice to produce her own original music. She’s been drawn to global and Persian folk music and her debut album is a collection of lullabies with distinct influences from around the world. She has cooperated with Arash Zarabi and Pouya Eshghinejad in producing the album.

 

Arash Zarabi, Double Bass Player, Recording Engineer

Arash Zarabi is a music composer, double bass player, performer and film score composer based in Tehran. He started his musical journey playing the double bass in different classical orchestras including the Tehran Symphony Orchestra, Iran’s National Orchestra, and Iran-Austria (AISO). At the moment, he is exploring new influences in his music by incorporating jazz, folk, soul, and alternative. Some of those genres led him to produce and perform independent projects like “The 32nd Street” at Darbast Platform, “Roonevisi” at Rooberoo Mansion, and “Street of Memories” rap-performance at the Amateur Society. His music has been performed at various events including Show of Hands, Fajr International Music Festival, Days of Experimental Sounds, Nahal Short Film Festival, Voice Project and New Voices Theatre Festival. He has collaborated with numerous artists in and out of Iran such as Hossein Alizadeh, Peyman Yazdanian, Siamak Ehsaei, Mahdyar Aghajani, Shahram Shojaei, Pozx, and Baran Ehsaei.

 

Amirhossein Taqavi, Cinematographer

Amirhossein Taqavi is a multi-disciplinary artist and filmmaker. He did his undergraduate studies at Beheshti University in Tehran in Architecture and continued his masters in Dramatic Literature at Soore University. He has made many alternative cinema works under the supervision of Mohamad Shirvani, a radical and important director in Iranian cinema. Taqavi has made multiple films about contemporary dance that have been shown in installation performances outside of Iran. Lately, he's been focusing on painting and sculpture with new materials, which has led him to a new realm of contempoary art, NTF work. He has an NFT website and has shown his art works in several well-known galleries in Tehran.

 

Reza Baraheni, Lyrics

Reza Baraheni, born in Tabriz in 1935, was an internationally recognized Iranian novelist, poet, literary critic, and human rights activist. He wrote more than 60 books in Persian and English; his works have been translated into a dozen languages. His commitment to social justice and freedom of speech led to arrests and torture by both the regimes of the Shah and the Islamic Republic, and ultimately to his exile. In exile, Baraheni continued his activism work, for instance serving as president of PEN Canada (2001-03), testifying before the U.S. Congress and rallying intellectuals like Arthur Miller, Noam Chomsky and Susan Sontag to question American support of the Shah (1978). Baraheni taught at numerous universities: University of Tehran, University of Texas at Austin, Indiana University, Bloomington, University of Maryland, Baltimore, and University of Toronto, where he won the Scholars-at-Risk-Program Award. Baraheni lived in Canada until his death in 2022.

 

Sheida Dayani, Lyrics Translator

Bio forthcoming

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SRS Issyk-Kul (Kyrgyzstan)

 

Gulzada Ryskulova, Vocalist, Composer, Lyricist

The vocalist-songwriter Gulzada Ryskulova (gulzada) grew up in the Osh area, which was a vibrant Silk Routes location. Ryskulova is of nomadic Kyrgyz ancestry and from an early age she gravitated to traditional Kyrgyz music, some of which was censored during the Soviet Union era. She is especially interested in the cultural legacy of her kindred peoples, the Kyrgyz and Turkic peoples. At the same time that Ryskulova celebrates Kyrgyz cultural heritage, she pushes at conventional and nationalistic boundaries by experimenting with diverse musical genres and challenging traditional patriarchy. Ryskulova has authored over 100 works and performed in more than 300 international concerts in China, Japan, South Korea, India, Kuwait, the UAE, Turkey, Russia, Austria, Holland, France, Switzerland, and the U.S. She was the representative of Kyrgyz culture at the UN World Congress of Women in Switzerland and has served as Volunteer Ambassador of the World Nomad Games.

 

Diana Rakhmanova, Location Director

Diana Rakhmanova is an artist, curator, art manager, researcher, and journalist. She is the founder of PF Cultural Center “Kuduk” in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. Rakhmanova curates educational projects on eco-art, data-art and art management in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. She also creates installations, discussions and cooking-together happenings, considering food as an art language of cultural exchange. Most of Diana’s work is autobiographical based on memories, internal reflections, and the history of Tajikistan. Her work has been exhibited in Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine, the USA, and included as part of the DAVRA collective at Documenta fifteen. She has participated in art residencies in Mexico, Costa Rica, and Colombia.

 

Kylymdar Asykbekov, Komuz Player

Bio forthcoming

 

Chyngyz, Choor Player

Bio forthcoming

 

Meikin, Guitar Player

Bio forthcoming

 

Ilya Karimdjanov, Cinematographer

Bio forthcoming

 

Pavel Potashov, Cinematographer

Bio forthcoming

 

Vadim Bykov, Recording Engineer

Bio forthcoming

 

Nurgul Karyberkova, Lyrics Translator

Nurgul Karybekova is a dedicated educator and accomplished translator with 12 years of experience specializing in English-Kyrgyz translations. A linguaphile from an early age, Nurgul has successfully completed over 18 significant translation projects, including literary works such as children's books, poetry, manuscripts on the Epic of Manas, documentary films, and official documents. In 2016, Nurgul was honored with the "Best Translator of the Year" award for her outstanding translation of renowned American children's books into Kyrgyz.

 

Post-production

 

Jean Martin, Sound Producer

Jean Martin is a drummer, multi-instrumentalist and producer based in Toronto with a network of collaborators across Canada and internationally. As a performer, some of his principal associations are with Tanya Tagaq, Christine Duncan Barnyard Drama, The Element Choir, Jesse Zubot, John Southworth, ZMF Trio, Bernard Falaise, and Justin Haynes. He has performed and recorded with notable artists including David Murray, Evan Parker, William Parker, Veryan Weston, Phil Minton, and Craig Tayborn. In 2024, he received the Freddy Stone Award for excellence in contemporary music in Canada. As a producer and recording engineer, Martin is best known as the Artistic Director of Barnyard Records, one of the most vital labels for contemporary music in North America, dedicated primarily to Canada's diverse field of creative musicians. In addition to his work with Barnyard, Martin has produced and/or engineered over 100 other recording projects in countless musical styles.

 

Chris Ferrari, Video Editor

Chris Ferrari has been collaborating with artist Millie Chen for over a decade, contributing to the production of her audio and video projects, including (SRS) Silk Road Songbook. With a deep appreciation for landscapes, Chris is drawn to work that not only raises awareness of sociopolitical issues but also highlights the natural beauty and wonder of our planet. As an avid outdoorsman, he values the connection between art and environment, recognizing how landscapes shape culture, history, and experience. His technical expertise and passion for storytelling help bring immersive, thought-provoking projects like (SRS) Silk Road Songbook to life.

 

Sangjun Yoo, Technology Designer

Based in the U.S. and South Korea, Sangjun Yoo holds a Ph.D. in Digital Media and Experimental Arts from the University of Washington and is an Assistant Professor at James Madison University. Yoo’s work involves a temporal variation and architectural metamorphosis of the ‘screen’ as a receptive surface where the invisible becomes visible, and image and information combine into a certain figuration. Based on his research of screens, digital apparatus, systems, and user interactivity, Yoo’s work explores the correlation between technology and perception, and the phenomenological understanding of distance and imagined space. His exhibitions include: Cynetart Festival and Beyond Festival in Germany; SEA Foundation, Netherlands; FILE Video Art, Brazil; FONLAD Digital Arts Festival, Portugal; Kobe Biennale 2013, Japan; Gwanghwamoon International Art Festival, South Korea. Yoo has exhibited across the U.S. and has been awarded artist residencies in New York City, Seattle, Buffalo, Spokane and Tilburg, Netherlands.

 

Yasmeen Siddiqui, Publisher

Yasmeen M. Siddiqui is an editor, writer, educator, and artistic director of Minerva Projects, an independent press based in the Hudson Valley. Minerva Projects publishes writings about contemporary culture with a focus on unorthodox and muted stories about the lives and work of artists. She is co-editor (with Alpesh Kantilal Patel) of Storytellers of Art Histories (Intellect Press, 2022). Her articles and essays have been published by: Phaidon, Samsung Museum of Art, Art Papers, Modern Painters, Flash Art, NKA, the Cairo Times, iniva (Institute of International Visual Arts), the Americas Society, Storefront for Art and Architecture, among others. She has received fellowships and recognitions, including from Yaddo and Ucross Foundation as a writing fellow. Her writing and research have been recognized by Independent Curators International and the Andy Warhol Foundation. Siddiqui is on the faculty at Pratt Institute and serves as a board member of Voices in Contemporary Art (VoCA).