Mariya Ocher


Mary Ocher is a recording artist, performer, poet, director and visual artist.

Music

At age 14, she recorded her first song, produced by Idan Raichel, who later went on to become a successful mainstream world-music producer. She officially changed name to Ocher at age 18. In December 2006, she formed a band, Mary and The Baby Cheeses, in Tel Aviv, and in October of the following year, the band moved to Berlin, where she would later change the entire line-up. The band produced several DIY releases, the most notable being a collection of studio recordings titled Analog music for a digital generation. In December 2008, she released a solo album recording titled War Songs, with 13 acoustic apocalyptic folk songs about war, crime and other related themes.
In mid-2009, she took part in Voices – a fundraiser event for Physicians for Human Rights in Gaza organized by Eleanor Cantor aka Sister Chain and a small group of volunteers, that was held twice at Filmbuehne in Berlin and once more on 10 May 2010 in the city of Muenster.
In January 2011, she joined the German Indie band 1000 Robota, on the 2nd leg of their German tour.
The re-issue of War Songs by the German label "Haute Areal" came out in Germany, Spain, Switzerland and Austria on 11 March 2011, and its first single, "On the Streets of Hard Labor" had been released two weeks prior, on 25 February 2011.
On December 2, 2011, Haute Areal released a 7" EP with four new tracks: King khan's version of "The sound of war", the synthpop "Address Yourself Entirely to Me", "Man of 1000 Faces" and "Ugly, Ugly Girls" – the latter two from the War Songs sessions.
She also accompanied musically the short play based on Andy Warhol's autobiography with German actor Peter Pagel at the Hans Otto Theater in Potsdam.
In early 2012 she was invited to perform music for the production of Maxim Gorki Theater's adaptation of Sven Regener's book "Der Kleine Bruder", directed by Milan Peschel, but she was fired for creative differences.
And on 30 June 2012 she played the most notorious of German festivals, the Fusion festival.
Also in June 2012, she was asked to join Ned Collette + Wirewalker's Australian tour.
In October 2012, Ocher went on tour with the German bestseller author Sibylle Berg, alongside actors Katja Riemann and Matthias Brandt to promote Berg's new book Vielen dank für das Leben. The tour visited most large German cities, as well as Zurich, and it was entirely sold-out. Along the shows, a video was made for the song "The final embrace ".
In spring 2012 on Ocher has auditioned various drummers for an act with two drummers. On October 6, "Mary Ocher + Your Government" premiered at the performance festival "Foreign Affairs” at the Berliner Festspiele.
The second album, EDEN, produced by King Khan of King Khan and the Shrines and The King Khan and BBQ Show came out on Buback on 14 June 2013. Guests on the album featured King Khan himself, The Shrines' drummer Mirko Wenzel as well as Kyle Gibson, drummer of The Fresh & Onlys. The first single "Baby Indiana" was released on 1 June 2013 and second single, "The Android Sea" on 28 July 2013. The second vinyl edition of the album includes the bonus tracks Lullaby for a murderer and Poor boy from the wild lands. Owing to the unusual number of videos that were made for the album, they were released once a week, for two months. The music video for "Baby Indiana" featured King Khan, Jessie Evans, Drop Dead festival's Polina Y and Art Stars' Nadja Sayej.
EDEN ranked #12 in :de:Intro |Intro Magazine's list of Albums of The Year of 2013.
In November 2013 Ocher joined forces with German avant-garde poet/songwriter :de:Hans Unstern|Hans Unstern and the Great Hans Unstern Swindle for a wide German/Austrian tour.
In January 2014 she joined Die Goldenen Zitronen for a few live dates.
In late February 2014 she set out for North America for a 2-month/50 date grandiose tour – of which 48 dated were in the USA and 2 in Canada. with only but a few days off, the route went from the west coast to the east – with stops at SXSW, various gallery shows, colleges and locations as odd as vintage shops and a couple of house shows – the tour had been documented for a film: 8.5 weeks: Mary does USA".
In the summertime the crowdfunding campaign for Ocher's debut album with Your Government was launched, it featured a series of episodes of Between Two Drummers, a friendly nod to Between Two Ferns. some of the guests were Nina Hynes, Ned Collette and Molly Nilsson.
In September 2014 Ocher returned to the US for a few selected West Coast dates, around the GENESIS show for The Art of Elysium charity at LA's Ace Hotel, to which she was invited by Karen O and Rain Phoenix. Among the other participants were SoKo, Moses Sumney, Ariel Pink, Moby and Cat Power.
On March 31, 2015, Ocher has released a double anthology of home recordings with over 40 tracks recorded between 2006 and 2015, available for free streaming or purchase on Bandcamp.
Two of Ocher's songs are featured in the horror film Ava's Possessions, of which soundtrack is curated by Sean Lennon and will be released on a limited edition 10" on his label Chimera Music. The film is directed by Jordan Galland – a fellow musician/director.
On January 7, 2016 the debut full-length album with Your Government was released on legendary krautrock/experimental label Klangbad. Its follow-up "The West Against The People" was recorded at the Faust Studio with Irmler in the summer of 2016 and released on March 10, 2017. The album features an essay analyzing the current sociopolitical climate, as well as solo tracks, tracks with Your Government and collaborations with Die Toedliche Doris and Felix Kubin. A special edition of the album grants access to further tracks that were revealed gradually throughout 2017.
The release of "The West Against The People" was announced in January 2017 in Fact, with the tag line:
"Prediction: one of the best albums of 2017". Bandcamp listed the album #51 on their "100 Best Albums of 2017". The second edition of the record was pressed within three months of its release. Ocher went on to perform in some 30 countries with the record within 2 years of its release.
Also in Jan 2017, "Arms" was released with a video shot in Israel and released alongside a collection of remixes – all of which profits are donated to a Berlin-based NGO helping war asylum seekers.
The video for "Arms" caused a minor controversy with its imagery of Israeli soldiers wandering casually in public spaces with big guns, it was nominated for a MuVi award at Oberhausen film festival, and selected for the Cologne Women's Film Festival.
Before the end of 2017 further recordings were released in the form of "The Faust Studio Sessions and Other Recordings". She has performed in over 20 countries with the two releases in 2017, and still counting.
In January 2019 new pieces with Your Government were performed live for German channel SWR's production Art's Birthday.
In May 2019 she's toured the US and CAN with Your Government for the first time, followed by dates in Scandinavia and the UK in August, Australia and New Zealand in September and a sold out homecoming show with Your Government at the Deutsche Oper Berlin in October.
In 2019-2020 she has been working on new recordings, most of which were recorded at Palazzo Stabile in the north of Italy and mixed with Mike Lindsay of Tunng in Margate.
On July 17 2020 she performed at the first larger scale socially-distanced music event in Berlin at Haus der Kulturen der Welt, opposite the German parliament.
Ocher has collaborated with electronic producers Snax and TUSK and recorded background vocals for the German act Jolly Goods, the English Glen Strachan, Spanish The Mustache and American Skiing, on the track so long off their 'Another wave' album. She's also sung backing vocals for King Khan's collaborative project with Die Ärzte's Bela B and Rummelsnuff – Kuschelsnuff, and on Rita Braga's cover of Bruce Haack's "National Anthem to The Moon".
An adaptation of the Snax-produced version of "I, human" is out on October 4 on Buback along with 5 remixes, as a digital remix EP. The cover photo and the music video were entirely made with an Israeli team from Moshe Rosenthal – to Hadas Hinkis and Yehuda Swed. The music video features Ocher's father, as the head of the Victorian family.
She has been awarded a scholarship by The Music Board / Berlin Senate for artistic development in 2015.
And was invited to be one of five judges on the Music Board's committee selecting projects for the monthly event series »Pop-Kultur lokal« in 2018.
Among the festivals and associated events she played: Folktale, Berlin Festee, Oddpop, Antifolk festival, Mother – A feminist festival, Tel Aviv Music Festival, What's Queer About Queer Pop Today?, Avant-Garde Festival, TRAMA, Steirischer Herbst, Chewing the scenery – 54th Venice Biennale opening, Kampnagel summer festival, Fusion, The Queer Festival, Jerk Off, Festspiele, Treibstoff, Reeperbahn Festival, CTM Festival, Slingshot festival, SKIF, ROODKAPJE RADICALS, Northern Winter Beat, 1,2 Piecefest, Pop Kultur festival, Pop Montreal, Nordwind festival, Pop Freaks, Detmold festival, Bang! festival, Theater Der Welt Festival, Totstr. Festival, Internationale Schillertage Festival, Santarcangelo Festival, Ketzerpop Festival, Yo Sissy Festival, Supernormal Festival, Wolkenkuckucksheim Festival, Homo Novus Festival, Cool v Plote Festival, Meakusma Festival, Time Zones Festival, Soy Festival, Piano Festival, No! Music, Blue Bird festival, SXSW, Women's Film Festival, FK:K Festival, Krake Festival, Ruhrtriennale, Night of Surprise, Werkleitz Festival, SPARK Festival/Gorki Theater, Off The Radar Festival Contra Pop Festival, FOJAM Festival.

Releases

In mid-2009 til 2011 several poems were published, later to be collected into a limited edition booklet sold at shows, and The Origins of Evil, a photography project which has been published in several on-line and printed magazines.
In April 2009, she organized The Queens and The Rebels Festival for theatrical music/performance art and multimedia at the legendary Tacheles complex in Berlin. The second edition of the festival was held on April 18, 2010 at the RAW Temple, Berlin.
In February 2010, Ocher organized The 15 Minutes Festival in Tel Aviv, on Rothchild Blvd, where several musicians and poets performed for a mixed crowd.
As of 2008 until mid 2014, Ocher has been working with Julien Binet on the documentary The Sounds of Softness with a variety of collaborators and guest appearances, amongst which members of Malaria!, Einstürzende Neubauten and Cluster as well as Hanin Elias, formerly of Atari Teenage Riot and authors Ken Shakin and François Jonquet.
The film is about a late-1970s avant-garde movement.
In March 2011, Ocher was asked to participate in a campaign for Lomography, "LomoAmigo", to shoot everyday situations for several months with their analog cameras.
She participated in group exhibition Zum Schein, at the Neurotital gallery/Berlin, and another at Quai de la Batterie in Arras, France.
On December 18, 2011, Ocher created a site-specific installation titled Restaurant.
In December 2013, ARTE broadcast the episode of Into The Night in which Ocher spent a night wandering around the streets of Hamburg with Sasha Grey, meeting interesting characters such as Polish-German artist Mariola Brilowska.
in August 2014 a video retrospective of Ocher's work was shown at Berlin's Galeire Nord, as part of "A Room of One's Own" exhibition.
Ocher is a member of the art collective Autodiktat; along with Documenta performer Peter Baecker, Austrian rebel Kris Kind and Irani-Austrian, Cannes film festival favorite Kamikat.se – all conceptual artists. their first exhibition as a collective was set for the last weekend of October 2014 at the Berlin underground music/art space West Germany.
She is also associated with the Australian Colour-Parade collective – aka The Colour Kids, that gave birth to The Adornists movement.
Ocher's Dogme 95 inspired short film Pawnshop Santa won an award at Berlin's underground film festival, Boddinale in February 2015. the film has been available for streaming online.
In April–May 2015 Ocher has embarked on the 3.5 week Hovering Suns tour of SE Asia as well as Australia and New Zealand. unfortunately, the Australian leg of the tour had to be cancelled.
In October 2017 she was commissioned to write a soundtrack for film projections of her liking as part of the International Film Festival of Ghent, she chose Ballet Mechanique and the Triadisches Ballett, performed with two synthesizers, vocal effects, a self made flute and a piano – using the bare strings and pedals as percussion. In November she was commissioned to perform John Cage's notorious 4"33 at Berlin's Haus der Kulturen der Welt as part of No! Music Festival. In 2018 she has collaborated on pieces by fusion jazz harpist Dorothy Ashby with her drummers and Mbira player Stella Chiweshe, later in the year she has also narrated a surrealist 16mm art film inspired by waterbears by the title "The Hot & The Cold" by artist duo Anja Dornieden and Juan David Gonzalez Monroy, to be shown in 3D.
She has directed several music videos for herself, as well as the German/Spanish folk singer Fee Reega, the multi-national collective Lemercier and The Lala By, French electronic producer Jules Valeron, American pop-performance artist DUBAIS, darkwave/industrial act Big Debbie, French-Canadian IDM producer Joni Void, and German/Turkish crooness Susanna Berivan. in addition to the documentaries All of my problems are imaginary and Love Starvation Economy. Many of Ocher's various video-art pieces with original music and texts, photography, typography and drawings are online on various platforms.
In early 2020 Mary has founded the artist agency and platform for culture Underground Institute, and remains its creative director.
The UI features artists such as veterans Limpe Fuchs, Martin Rev of Suicide, composer Heidi Mortenson, performer M Lamar, producer Ya Tosiba and others.
In spring 2020 the UI launched a series of artist curated radio shows - "Underground Institute Picks" in collaboration with Dublab, Jolt Radio, Soho Radio and Resonance FM, Cashere Radio and Reboot.fm, and more.
"Underground Institute Picks" episodes have been curated by cult and underground artists including Paddy Steer, members of the bands Chicks on Speed and Fenster, owner of the legendary Voodoo Rhythm Records, Reverend Beat-Man, Felix Kubin, Jessie Evans, King Khan and many others.
Interview Magazine chose Ocher as their Superstar of October 2013.

Personal life

Ocher was born Mariya Ocheretianskaya in Moscow, an only child to a voice and puppet theater actor father and an unemployed engineer mother both of Jewish/Ukrainian descent. Her family immigrated to Israel in 1991, first to a kibbutz in Negev and several months later to Tel Aviv.
While studying at a religious Jewish school in Israel, she was forced to change her name to Miriam for several years. In her teenage years, she studied film in an art high school in Tel-Aviv, which she then left at the beginning of the 12th grade. At the age of 18, she adopted Ocher as a last name.
Ocher's grandmother, Julia, was married to prominent Russian historian/author Natan Eidelman, in the last years before his death.
Alix, her dad was named after an SS officer who saved his father's life during WWII, her mother, Yelena took part in the mapping of the moon in the 1970s in Moscow.

List of music videos

In Mary and The Baby Cheeses:
Gil Cohen
Ran Nahmias
Karen Phenpimon-Zehavi
Rina "Athena Nej"
Pax Chimera
Alessia D'Artino
Aaron "Big Daddy Mugglestone" Snyder
In Mary Ocher + Your Government:
Oliver Rivera-Drew
Abraham Yussef Zamora
Stefan Widdess
Andi Stecher
Mats Folkeson
Brandon Walsh
Theo Taylor