MIASMA, (1991 - present) by Davies & Gut

What is MIASMA?

MIASMA is a creative collaboration between Canadian writer, performer, and media artist, Myra Davies, and Berlin Electronica composer and broadcaster, Gudrun Gut. Since 1991, MIASMA has been the umbrella for the duo's multi-faceted creative process that begins with spoken word and music and encompasses film and video, live concert shows, theatrical productions, dance, internet media, writing in print, and gallery installation.

Over the years, women from many countries have participated on stage and in the recording studio in MIASMA's irreverent critiques of Romanticism, satirical exposés of female fantasies, and parables about art and culture and their influence on identity.

With Gut in Berlin and Davies in the Rocky Mountain resort of Banff in Canada, Miasma has one foot in the city and the other in the wilderness. Production and performance activity shifts between these two locations and both sites strongly inform the work.

Gut & Davies have an interest in diversity, mixed disciplinary practice, collaborations and partnerships, and in inviting other artists and members of the community to join them on stage and in the studio.

The following choreographers have used Davies/Gut sound tracks for theatrical dance: Lola MacLaughlin (Lola MacLaughlin Dance, Vancouver), Christopher House, (Toronto Dance Theatre, Toronto), Walter Wittich (Alberta Ballet, Calgary), Chick Snipper, (Vancouver, for University of Calgary Dance), and Allan Kaeja (Kaeja Dance, Toronto) for soloist, Mary Louise Albert (Vancouver).

Funding for MIASMA productions has been provided by: The Canada Council for the Arts, FACTOR, The Alberta Foundation for the Arts, The Goethe Institute, and The Women's Department of The Senate of Berlin, (Frauenreferat). Production support and facilities have been provided by The Banff Centre for the Arts: Media & Visual Arts, The Leighton Artists Studios, Theatre Arts, and The Music & Sound Department.

SHORT BIOS DAVIES - GUT

Myra Davies (Canada) is a writer. She is also a media and recording artist, cabaret performer, dance and theatre producer, video artist, art critic, eccentric intellectual, and always an anthropologist. Mentoring Skinny Puppy in the mid-eighties, Myra brought Neubauten to Vancouver, thus visited Germany at the invitation of EN's Mark Chung, and so came to work with Gudrun Gut in Berlin. She lives in the seclusion of the mountains, in Banff, Canada.

Gudrun Gut (Germany) is an audio artist and radio producer. The owner of two record companies dedicated to the production of unconventional work by women, she is a skilled recording engineer and record producer with a special interest in fostering creative opportunities for women in digital audio technology. She has composed scores for film, video and live theatre and is active as a DJ in the European club scene. She lives in Berlin.