About
Marfa Myths was an annual music festival and multidisciplinary cultural program founded in 2014 by nonprofit contemporary arts foundation Ballroom Marfa and Brooklyn-based music label Mexican Summer. In 2015, The festival expanded from one night to three days and initiated a multi-disciplinary program that featured a sound installation, film screening, and recording residency. With Marfa Myths, the two organizations bring together a diversity of emerging and established artists and musicians to work creatively and collaboratively across music, film, and visual arts contexts. The festival is inherently embedded in the landscape of Far West Texas, and engages with Marfa’s cultural history and present-day community.
Lineup
2015 programming includes a recording residency with Dev Hynes and Connan Mockasin, a sound bath created by Jefre Cantu-Ledesma, a semi-permanent outdoor mural by Liz Harris (Grouper), a presentation of Gregg Kowalsky’s live installation Tape Chants, and a screening of short documentaries and Holy Cow Swami at the Crowley Theater presented by CineMarfa and Anthology Recordings. Furthermore, live programming throughout the weekend will include sets from Iceage, Grouper, Tamaryn, Steve Gunn, Weyes Blood, GABI, Thug Entrancer, Co La, Bitchin Bajas, LBS. and Suicideyear.
Recording Residency
Dev Hynes & Connan Mockasin
Myths 001 is an EP from Connan Mockasin and Devonté Hynes, written and recorded in Marfa, TX as part of the 2015 Marfa Myths festival. The release is truly collaborative – each of its three tracks are fingerprinted with the pair’s distinctive, idiosyncratic take on pop. Stylistically, things move from breathy post-punk (“La Fat Fur”), to underwater funk (“Feelin’ Lovely”), to sparse, heartbreak balladry (“Big Distant Crush”). The album was released October 30, 2015
Marfa Map Poster
Ross Cashiola & Boyd Elder
Special screen-printed map of the venues featured in Myths, drawn and designed by artists Ross Cashiola and the legendary Boyd Elder.
Artist in Residence
Liz Harris
Liz Harris, of Grouper, spent a week in Marfa painting a mural in the Lumberyard.
As Grouper, Liz Harris combines aspects of ambient and dream pop into ethereal, reverb-heavy music that is equally mysterious and moving. She uncovers different nuances within this approach on each of her many releases, which range from the lush and relatively poppy territory of 2008’s widely acclaimed Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill to 2012’s sprawling double-album A I A to more intimate works like 2018’s Grid of Points.
Exhibition
Sam Falls at Ballroom Marfa
Ballroom opened Sam Falls on Friday of Marfa Myths with a live performance in the courtyard from GABI, Thug Entrancer, Co La. The exhibition highlighted Falls’ multidisciplinary approach to time and representation, the show will feature new sound, video, sculptural, and wall works.
Sam Falls opening reception, March 13, 2015. Photo by Jennifer Boomer.
Myths Moments
