Jazz pianist, composer, and multimedia artist Jason Moran works at the intersection of visual art and music. By exploring the boundaries between the stage, sculpture, and performance, Moran considers the generative possibilities of composition and improvisation and draws attention to the rich history of American jazz. Following his interest in the experience of live music and its often-ephemeral afterlife, Moran’s work has taken many forms, ranging from video and works on paper to staging performances within set-like installations. 

Dandelion grew out of a series that Moran began in 2015, in which he used his piano as an instrument to draw and experiment with mark-making, extending his engagement with improvisation. The artist created the work by layering gampi paper over the keys of a piano, then coating the paper with dry pigment and performing. Moran describes such works as sonic paintings, leaving a trace of his hands as they move across the keyboard. In effect, the accumulation of marks becomes a score, recording the artist’s gestures at the piano. The resulting abstract composition registers the physical expression of music, both of the instrument and the body of the performer.

About the artist: Jason Moran (b. 1975, Houston, TX) attended the Manhattan School of Music in New York in 1997, where he studied with John Arthur “Jaki” Byard. In 1999, he released his debut album, Soundtrack to Human Motion, with Blue Note Records. Moran has collaborated with visual and performing artists, receiving commissions for compositions from institutions, such as the Walker Art Center, Dia Art Foundation, and Lincoln Center. He taught at the New England Conservatory of Music (2010–2016) and served as the Artistic Director for Jazz at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC (2014–2021). In 2010, he was named a MacArthur Fellow and in 2014 he was a Grammy nominee.

In 2015, Moran exhibited the first of his “set” sculptures at the Venice Biennale. In 2018, he had his first solo museum exhibition at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN, that subsequently traveled to the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, the Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, OH, and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. His work is represented in numerous public collections, including the Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; and the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN, among others.