digital music distribution (2022 remix)
Emma Burgess-Olson (Umfang), Jace Clayton (DJ/Rupture), Straith Schreder (palm.io), +surprise guest :)
Presented by NEW INC and Ace Hotel Brooklyn
Friday, July 22, 7pm -8pm (doors @ 6:30)
Ace Hotel Brooklyn
Atrium
252 Schermerhorn Street
*Followed by NEW INC’s Year 8 End of Year Party at 8:30pm in The Lobby at Ace Hotel Brooklyn
digital music distribution (2022 remix) gathers a varied set of perspectives together to share their visions for a future of music distribution that prioritize artists' ability to make a living while introducing sophisticated ways to maintain ease of access, sharing, and integration within established technological structures. As part of their ongoing partnership, Ace Hotel Brooklyn and NEW INC have collaborated with Emma Burgess-Olson aka Umfang to platform and moderate this discussion.
While the internet, video hosting sites, and streaming have provided unprecedented access to music libraries, often for free, individual musicians, artists, producers, and DJ’s have seen their ability to make a livelihood significantly shrink. Legal regulations, namely the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, allow sites to host content without paying copyrights to creators and the music industry’s payment and distribution models have become devastatingly outdated.
Can a DJ clear the rights of the music they sample and legally sell mixes while compensating original creators? Is there a new utility for publishing albums on the blockchain? Should music be free? Shared? Owned? digital music distribution (2022 remix) tries to answer these questions and more.
Emma Burgess-Olson aka Umfang is a New York City based DJ, producer, editor, and co-founder of artist agency Discwoman. She has a particular interest in analyzing the music industry's shortfalls and exploring what can be changed to make working conditions more just for artists in the age of big tech.
Straith Schreder is the Executive Creative Director for Palm NFT Studio, where she’s responsible for developing and producing breakthrough NFT experiences in collaboration with artists, institutions, and IP: including the launch of Damien Hirst’s The Currency, a project exploring digital and physical value structures. A specialist in digital storytelling and artist-first development, Straith has previously served as the Executive Creative Director for VICE Media Group and the VP of Creative Initiatives at BitTorrent, Inc.
Jace Clayton is an artist and writer based in New York, also known for his work as DJ /rupture. Clayton uses an interdisciplinary approach to focus on how sound, memory, and public space interact, with an emphasis on low-income communities and non-Western geographies. He is the author of Uproot: Travels in 21st Century Music and Digital Culture (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2016) and was awarded a 2020 Andy Warhol Foundation Art Writers Grant to support Behold the Monkey, his upcoming book on contemporary art, faith, and social media. Clayton is currently Assistant Professor of Visual Arts at Columbia University and Interim Director of the Sound Art Program. Most recently, he composed an original soundtrack for Riotsville USA, a documentary directed by Sierra Pettengill, which premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival.
New Museum x Ace Hotel
The New Museum teams up with Ace Hotel New York and Ace Hotel Brooklyn for an eight-part series that animates a shared faith in discovery, a mutual devotion to artistic pursuits. The year-long lineup will sanctify the hotels with co-curated pop-ups, artist conversations, screenings and more.