Anyone taking in Wavelength's three-night residency at Creatures Creating will encounter a stage-immersive art installation by prolific Toronto visual artist Alexandra MacKenzie. Wearing her musician's hat as Petra Glynt, she will also be playing Thursday night's showcase. I exchanged some messages with Alex about music/drawing/collage/installations... and what makes them different from each other.

Wavelength: I'm intrigued to see what you come with for the installation. Any hints on what we can expect?

Alexandra MacKenzie: I am working on making a sort of engrossing backdrop... that involves a lot of cutting and gluing... cutting and gluing, cutting and gluing...

WL: When you take on a task like this, do you generally bring out material that you're already working on, or do you want to respond to the specific space?

AM: I consider these projects as part of the school of life or part of my self-education so I tend to want to research and experiment with new materials. This allows me to develop a sense for the new materials and open up my vocabulary for constructing things. Working within the installation realm is a relatively new art approach for me so I’m still feeling it out quite a bit – I know the space pretty well but I think that this installation is more of a response to materials I’ve been interested in working with.

WL: Your installation might make some music-focused people take a little more notice of visual art (I know I can sometimes get this way!). If people dig what they see, who are some other local visual artists that they should check out?

AM: There’s tons of awesome local artists! Mango Peeler, Exploding Motor Car (Winston Hacking and Brett Long), Alicia Nauta, Andrew Zukerman, Rebecca Fin, Dan Rocca, Tomas Del Balso, Melissa Fisher, Felix Kalmelson, ooaaah so many!

WL: As an artist who is working in several different media, how distinct are your works from each other? Have you ever started a drawing and thought, "no, that's a song" or vice-versa? How do they feed into each other?

AM: They are pretty distinct but often come from the same place. Music allows me to express things that drawing can’t and vice versa. As spontaneous and free as drawing can be, I would say collage and music are the most similar in nature for me, in terms of composition. Both are loose in their potential to be arranged and manipulated. Though music often resembles my relationship with drawing in how infinite it is – how it comes from nothing, from ideas, from the body, little tools, bits of technology, and you can get as deep as you like – where collage often feels limited by a need for existing images to keep things rolling. One of the most beautiful things about music is that it can speak in a lyrical language that everyone can understand, and thus music can be written with a more literal intention, where often my visual art struggles to do so.

WL: Maybe following from that "literal intention", your music has always struck me as being "folk" (in the cultural sense rather than the musical one) in that it's a sort of a soundtrack to a community-based interaction where both the artist and audience have some sort of ownership. Is there a sort of creative tension for you, now that you're taking it on the road and playing to more crowds with strangers instead of friends?

AM: No, there is no new tension, I feel instead more creative freedom/possibilities. I have been meeting new friends and lovely people, but I do agree with you on the "folk" reference. I am making music to satisfy an aspect of myself, but also as a means to move others and bring people together under difficult circumstances. Community is fragile and often barely tangible here in Toronto – it’s lurking around but it’s hard to harness and maintain. One has to take it upon themselves to organize, and it’s a lot of work (where do we congregate? who has the space or how can we afford it?). This music calls for organized movements, for community: it can be a reminder that we’re all in it together.

WL: Has playing more shows caused any other unexpected evolutions in Petra Glynt?

AM: The project feels super fresh for me still. I feel that I have a lot of workshopping ahead of me. I wrote a handful of songs last August and since then my ideas have definitely been evolving – I am gaining more creative freedom and ease with the technology and approaches I am taking. All I know is that right now, I want to make dance music: music that resonates through the heart, that is felt deeeeply, that makes me want to move involuntarily. Drums, percussion, bass, with nature’s elements, in a blender with a limitless number of settings: grate, chop, puree, etc.

WL: Given that you're playing NXNE (at WL and also in Saturday's Silent Shout show here), what else do you plan to go check out?

AM: I’m gonna try and make what I can. There’s so muuuuch happening. I would like to be there for the Offerings Showcase, the other Wavelength Showcases, the Arbutus one, and stick around for the rest of the Silent Shout night – unfortunately some things overlap... I’ll have to be two places at once.

WL: Yeah, in the absence of NXNE clones I'll be dealing with the same thing, too. But I'm looking forward to seeing the show and the installation. Thanks for your time!

AM: Thanks Joe!