Alexandra Jacob and Jesse Gelaznik, ERA OF GOOD FEELINGS, La MaMa Galleria, NYC, 2019.
DIRTY CHURCHES
Biography
“Dirty Churches manipulates the boundaries of theater, installation, and sculpture, orchestrating characters as they travel through layered compositions that utilize mysticism and speculative fiction to articulate conditions of our current times and ways of being” - La MaMa Galleria.
Dirty Churches is a collaborative, New York based performance art duo that explores the intersections of myth, ritual, and music through theatrical performances with live scores, psychedelic songs, and vocal harmonies. Music by Jesse Gelaznik and costume performances by Rachel Blackwell (along with a rotating cast of musicians and performers).
Members
Jesse Gelaznik - A multifaceted artist obsessed with sound in all its forms, Jesse’s musical output ranges from analog 4-track recordings of bedroom pop songs to new music scores, operas, solo works and soundtracks. He performs on guitar, synthesizer, and electronics with the performance art collective Dirty Churches. His conceptual scores have been commissioned and premiered by Experiments in Opera, HUB New Music, S.E.M. Ensemble, Mattress Factory Museum, Hyde Museum and Sembrich Opera Museum. As a songwriter and performer Jesse has recently played DIRTY CHURCHES songs at the Owl Music Parlor, Rubulad, and Pete’s Candy Store.
Rachel Blackwell – costume creator and performance artist. She creates, constructs and performs as the creatures that inhabit Dirty Churches. She has shown independently and in collaboration at White Box, the 92Y Tribeca, Theater Lab, The Chelsea Hotel and many other galleries, festivals, clubs, theaters and music venues.
Contact
Instagram @dirtychurches
Inquiries at dirtychurches@gmail.com
DIRTY CHURCHES performing SIREN, live score by Jesse Gelaznik and Aaron Edgecomb, Whitebox, NYC, 2023.
Artist CV
Performance
2025 POWER MOVES, Greenbox, Whitebox Gallery, New York, NY.
2024. EATER OF HEARTS, EndGame, Whitebox Gallery, New York, NY.
2023 SIREN, Eldon Garnet: Saved and Drowned, Whitebox Gallery, New York, NY.
2022 The RAVEN, Ballots not Bullets, Whitebox Gallery, New York, NY.
2021 RUMPLES (a Dirty Churches video opera), Mattress Factory Museum, Pittsburgh, PA.
2020 RUMPLES, Songs for Presidents, Brooklyn, NY.
2019 EXTERMINATOR’S METAMORPHOSIS, Picasso Machinery, Brooklyn, NY.
2018 SECOND INCARNATION, La MaMa Galleria, New York, NY.
EATER OF HEARTS, The Williamsburg Art and Historical Center, Brooklyn, NY.
BAD GENIE, Picasso Machinery, Brooklyn, NY.
2017 THE VISITATION, West Beth, New York, NY.
SILVER SUITE, Main Drag Music, Brooklyn, NY.
2016 NIGHT DIVINER, South Street Seaport, New York, NY.
2015 BE GONE / REBIRTH, White Box, New York, NY.
TRANS-WORLD HOLIDAY, Art Helix, 2015, Brooklyn, NY.
2013 AN ORCHARD OF ECHOES, Soho 20 Chelsea Gallery, New York, NY.
A GUEST IN THE CAVERN, Northside Townhall Community and Cultural Center, Brooklyn, NY.
2010 DIRTY CHURCHES – live at BPA, BPA, Brooklyn, NY.
DIRTY CHURCHES - Alive in Texas, Diverse Works, Houston, TX.
2009 RITUALS, 92Y Tribeca, New York, NY.
SAINT DEATH, Pete’s Candy Store, Brooklyn, NY.
2007 DIRTY CHURCHES – Live at Pianos, New York NY.
Opera
2021 RUMPLES (video opera), Mattress Factory Museum, Pittsburgh, PA.
2019 ERA OF GOOD FEELINGS, La MaMa Galleria, New York, NY.
Video Art
2021 EYES IN THE SKY
EVERYTHING BURNS / PAPER SOUNDS
2015 HEARTS ARE DUST
2014 BACCHUS' SKELETON
2010 CASTING OUT 9s’
SPUN NUN / SPUN PREACHER
2009 RITUALS
MEDITATIONS ON DEATH (Symbols)
MEDITATIONS ON DEATH (Ceremonies)
YES! WITCHES
2007 DEATH FOR SALE
DIRTY CHURCHES performing RUMPLES, at the Mattress Factory Museum, 2021
Press
“The result is a remix that can’t quite be downloaded.”
- Monica Drake, At Cinema 16, Music and a Happening in Brooklyn, The New York Times.
https://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/09/arts/09bspare.html
“There is the sense of being trapped, but also the chance to meditate the contours of that trap.”
- Leo Goldsmith, Women of NY Cinema, Not Coming to a Theater Near You.
http://www.notcoming.com/features/womenofnyccinema/
“[T]he works evoke a narrative world particularly unsettling in that it may or may not be a dream.”
- Rufus Lusk, Short Film, Live Score, Huffington Post.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/short-films-live-score_b_305775