About Masary Studios
MASARY Studios is a transdisciplinary artist collective reconsidering environments through site-specific installations using sound, light, interactivity, and performance. Based in Boston, the studio's practice includes live percussion performance, electronic music and production, facade projection-mapped video, artistic research, technology and materials fabrication, and the expansive use of animation. The studio is artist-owned and managed and was founded in 2015.
OUR PRACTICE
Whether introducing new instruments, devices, pieces, or using the environment itself as the tool, our work enhances and activates place and purpose. When exploring iconic architecture or natural environments, we investigate both the current uses and the cultural history of a place. What defines the community? What traditions exist? What is hidden within, behind, and around the site through concept and form? We take these questions, answers, and discovered themes to create sonic and visual motifs, weaving together a larger story. Our practice extends to traditional performance spaces, such as theaters, galleries and the like, with decidedly untraditional results. Whether it be activating 70+ musicians surrounding an audience at a concert hall, or projecting crowd-sourced materials onto a facade, our pieces are curious, fresh, and often surprising.
Who We Are
MASARY is an interdisciplinary collaborative team with artists at the center. Studio founders and principals are Sam Okerstrom-Lang and Ryan Edwards. The extensive creative and technical team expands out to coders, engineers, architects, designers, percussionists, animators, arts administrators & more.
MASARY Studios was originally founded in 2015 by Ryan and Samo.
Sam Okerstrom-Lang
Co-Founder and Principal
Sam Okerstrom-Lang or “Samo" is a Boston based media artist and designer focusing on 3D animation, video projection design, and live visual environments. Technology serves as a vehicle and tool in Samo’s practice in order to question the boundaries of digital communication, while in turn questions the boundary and function of the pixel. His work engages associations between technology, body, and perception by immersing the human sensory system with experiences that obscure the line between nirvana and dystopia.
CONTACT: samo@masarystudios.com
GRACE FO
Operations Director
Grace Fo has a background in biological anthropology, museology, and project management. Prior to joining MASARY, she worked at the Museum of Science, Boston, overseeing temporary exhibition projects developed and hosted by the Museum. She is passionate about accessible and immersive multimedia experiences that explore the intersection between the human experience, art, science, and technology.
CONTACT: grace@masarystudios.com
Caleb Hawkins
Design Director
Caleb Hawkins is an architectural designer, fabricator, and artist originally from Concord New Hampshire.
His artistic research practice explores the relationships between user experience, urban technologies, and architectural space to uncover new embodied perceptions and meaning. He works through computational experiments with interactive robotics, imaging technologies, custom fabrication techniques, and performance art.
CONTACT: caleb@masarystudios.com
nicholas medvescek
Business Manager
Nicholas Medvescek (he/him) is a creative producer crafting resilient practices to meet the demands of new media, new economies, and new audiences. He is passionate about the place where divergent disciplines meet and the ways art-thinking can address big, intractable challenges.
He has previously explored these intersections as the co-director of the MIT Hacking Arts festival and the Director of Projects at A R E A gallery. Alongside his role at Masary, he teaches in the Business of Creative Enterprises program at Emerson College.
CONTACT: nicholas@masarystudios.com
Ryan Edwards
Co-Founder and Principal
Ryan Edwards is a Boston-based sound and installation artist. His work is focused at the intersection of interactivity, sound and light. His work is often haptic, creating community, agency and participation through technology and new-media. Ryan’s work is influenced by the West African djembe repertoire in which he was immersed through his 20’s, and is balanced by an interest in electronic and urban dance music. Ryan is most proud to be a father of three beautiful children, Marcel, Jafiah and Maya.
CONTACT: ryan@masarystudios.com
Jeremy Stewart
Principal & Technical Director
Jeremy Stewart is a multimedia artist and performer researching the affective potential of distributed media systems through the creation of improvisational performances, artificial intelligence (A.I.) software, and wearable hardware. His work investigates the ways that technology can affect, interact with, and alter an individual’s agency, perception, and autonomy.
Stewart holds his PhD from the Electronic Arts program at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY.
CONTACT: drj@masarystudios.com
Odie desmith
Technical Manager
Odie DeSmith is a multimedia artist, composer, electronic music performer, and creative developer. His practice focuses on the ways in which emerging technologies can enable new forms of artistic exploration. His work has been showcased at the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression (NIME), Supplyframe DesignLab, and won the Ableton Award at the CalArts Expo.
DeSmith holds a BFA in MTIID (Music Technology: Intelligence, Interaction, and Design) and a minor in digital arts at California Institute of the Arts.
CONTACT: odie@masarystudios.com
Vincent ZHu
Technical Assistant
Vincent Zhu is a technician and artist with a background in computer science and film photography.
He merges his background in photo with technology and research to craft immersive experiences blending visuals, sound and tangible objects. He explores how built / digital environments transform natural environments and reshape perception, while investigating the interplay between AI comprehension and human expression. Vincent is currently a graduate student at Brown University expected to graduate 2024.
CONTACT: vz@masarystudios.com
