Brian Joseph Davis

Brian Joseph Davis (b. 1975-) is a Canadian artist and writer.
His work re-purposes popular culture, specifically music, and utilizes plagiarism and sampling to create new, conceptual works. Some examples include Minima Moralia, a punk rock 7 inch purported to be by Theodor Adorno and 10 Banned Albums Burned Then Played, where Davis burned ten randomly chosen "banned" albums then sampled whatever sound could be found to create new songs. His Yesterduh project combined those concerns with aspects of Relational Aesthetics by asking random visitors to an art gallery to sing the Beatles song "Yesterday" from memory. These attempts were recorded then assembled into the Yesterduh compact disc. In 2007 Blocks Recording Club issued a compilation of Davis' audio work so far called The Definitive Host.

In 2005 Coach House Books published his book Portable Altamont, a collection of avant garde humor dealing with celebrity culture. In 2007 ECW published I, Tania, a satirical novel based on the life of Patricia Hearst and the Symbionese Liberation Army. Davis also wrote a column for Arthur Magazine that sporadically appeared from 2007 to 2008.

External links and references

[http://www.slate.com/id/2183291] SLATE on I, Tania
[http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Megatron:+team+interview+with+Brian+Joseph+Davis+&+Steve+Kado.+The...-a0173375788] C Magazine interview, December, 2007
[http://www.frieze.com/column_single.asp?c=229] Frieze Magazine on Davis' Minima Moralia
[http://www.wnyc.org/shows/soundcheck/episodes/2006/06/15] Davis explains Yesterduh on WYNC
[http://www.brianjosephdavis.com] (official website)

C Magazine,Fall 2006 "Law and Ordering: On Evaluating Recent Canadian Neoconceptualism" by Earl Miller

Spin Magazine, December 2005