Axe of Art
yAMAHA Guitar Project

Flatline Gallery in Long Beach, partnered with Yamaha Music to facilitate this upcycled guitar project. Flatline selected artists to transform factory defect guitars, donated by Yamaha, into artwork. The "Art of The Axe" project is ancillary to a historic community outreach and sustainability program at Yamaha, that benefits local music students, as all the proceeds from the sale of the work are donated to local non-profits that support the study of music and art. Sound artist Brian Akenoh (instagram: @brianakenoh) and Hope Ezcurra collaborated on the destruction/rebirth of the below Yamaha acoustic guitar into the multidisciplinary work of art "Reliquary of Forgotten Songs". This interdisciplinary collaborative project uses film, sound-art, and sculpture/assemblage to create a haunting meditation on destruction and death. Sound recordings of the guitar being torn apart are  elongated and stretched out to the point that they are unrecognizable and seems to swell out to eternity. The work speaks to the concepts of religion, sacredness, degradation of memories, and the haunting beauty of natural occurring entropy contrasted with the venality of environmental degradation. The project  strives to open a intellectual dialogue about decay in its many forms and what we each consider sublime.

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Exhibition Dates were July 17 - August 8, 2021