Oblivia Bio

Aug.26, 2023

Jackie Stewart (a.k.a Oblivia) started working with sound as a medium in 1979. After early experiments involving electric guitar and vocals, Jackie Stewart found her voice on the turntables when she discovered the link between her visual collages and her sound work. Usually found performing with avant/psych/folk pioneers Smegma, her recent solo project entitled “uncracked” reveals a playfully disturbed sound world where toys and turntables are manipulated to conjure sound as faded memory, familiar to all, yet just beyond the far side of recognition. In 1979, Stewart started performing live improv pieces, inspired by the so-called “punk” music” scene, joining Gumby Antichrist with X.J.Elliot and Jerry A. (later known as Poison Idea), where she played guitar and performed experimental vocals. In 1983 she joined joined Smegma where she also played guitar, saxophone, cow bell, tape loops, Casio, electronics, Drums, Bass, turntables and vocals and has been known under such assumed names as, “rock and roll Jackie” and “Oblivia.” As a member of Smegma, Stewart has performed live with the Dead Kennedys, the Butthole Surfers, Perry Robinson, 1/2 Japanese, Merzbow, the Boredoms, Wolf Eyes, Tom Recchion, Steve Mackay, Aaron Dilloway and Joe McPhee. As a member of Smegma, Stewart has appeared on more than sixty recordings including Wolf Eyes/Smegma (De Stijl Records, 2003) Smegma with Steve Mackay – Thirty Years of Service (Radon, 2004) and Rumbings (Hanson Records, 2005). Recent years have seen the re-release of several early Smegma cassettes and Lps on CD including Pigs for Lepers (Pigface, 1982/Harbinger Sound, 2006) and Live 1991-1993 (Pigface Mojo 1994/ Resipiscent, 2006).

Working solo, Stewart recently performed as Helen Blazes 1904 at the Color Out of Space Festival in Brighton, UK (November 2006). She also appeared at the 7th annual High Zero Festival in Baltimore, performing alongside Jenny Graff (US) and Fuyuki Yamakawa (Japan) as well as performing solo. Other live collaborators have included The Beast, Replicock, Alessandro Bosetti, Dave Smollen, Joseph Hammer and Caroliner among others. Her current projects include compositions for Smegma, Replicock and Rodney Forest and collaborations with Nate Young of Wolf Eyes and John Weise. Stewart was featured on the cover of modern music magazine “The Wire” in conjunction with a feature article on Smegma.


Live in Portland ! on September 24, 2006

Sep.17, 2016

Marta Zapparoli & Jackie “Oblivia” Stewart

Marta Zapparoli & Jackie “Oblivia” Stewart “Live in Berlin”

Marta Zapparoli & Jackie “Oblivia” Stewart
Hisham Mayet & Ju Suk Reet Meate
Chiara Giovando
Madelyn Villano
Visuals by Mia Ferm

Saturday Sept. 24

Meeting of the Minds brings together local legends Jackie Stewart and Ju Suk Reet Meate of Smegma with guests Marta Zapparoli and Hisham Mayet of Sublime Frequencies. Marta Zapparoli and Jackie Stewart will premiere a new collaborative composition. There will also be solo performances from Chiara Giovando and Madelyn Villano as well as visuals by Cinema Project’s Mia Ferm. The performances coincide with the first exhibition opening of Disjeta’s CIR season 6. Come for the opening and stay for the show!
$5.00-$15.00 sliding scale

8317 N Interstate, Portland OR 97217
Co-presented with Flock, sound Tim Westcott

Marta Zapparoli is an Italian experimental sound artist, improviser , performer, and musician. She works and lives in Berlin since 2007. Her music mainly consists in strongly narrative sonic pieces that she builds using a wide variety of recording techniques. Although it could be qualified as abstract, Zapparoli’s music reveal an accurate sense of nativity, her soundscapes, built using real-time tape manipulation and mixing, creating sounds that are considered non-musical or overheard are usually qualified as dense,
tense & strongly emotional.

Jackie “Oblivia” Stewart started performing sound in 1979 in Portland, Oregon. Mostly performing within groups until 2001, when she performed a DJ “throw down” of sorts (both DJ’s performed at the same time) and it ended up as a collaboration. Groups Jackie has performed in include “the improvs” (1979), “Spy vs. Spy” (1980), “Babylon 2000” (1981-83), and “Smegma” (1982-present). Though Stewart experimented on guitar and very much enjoys vocals, she has found her focus with turntables. Her visual art medium is assemblage or collage, so it comes naturally to Jackie to assemble sounds. She enjoys hearing how beautiful or humorous “mixing” can be, in the same way things come together visually when assembling her cut-up art pieces. With Smegma she says “I can enjoy a freedom of expression, totally unrestricted and of my own: as in I choose to interpret what my part will sound like. It has enabled me to learn much about recording and live performance.” Jackie’s sounds have appeared on dozens of releases, both solo and in group formats, in addition to her work with video.

Hisham Mayet is not a musician.  He is also not an artist.  He lives on the “other side” of 82nd Ave.  Its all these these things that
he’ll bring to an event that should inspire to free the shackles of the mental prison that seems to perpetuate the ironic cages of Portland OR.

Ju Suk Reet Meate was born in 1952, to a non musical family in Covina Calif and began playing Trumpet (not very well) in 4th Grade public school thru High School marching band. Shortly after moving to Pasadena in 1972, and with no further Musical training ” The Artist ” Ju Suk Reet Meate  was born, and with lots of help from friends Started the band Smegma ( the band without musicians)in 1973 which continues to this day.    Moving to portland, in 1975 He started Pigface Records ,putting out Tiny Quantities of 45’s , EP’s,  LP’s and Cassettes some with hand drawn covers that are now very collectible  .   Has been playing live Gigs( mostly in portland),a few times a year, ever since  as 1/2 of The Tenses with Rock and Roll Jackie ( also of Smegma). In the last few years, Smegma has had successful shows  in Vasteras , London, Paris, and at The Getty Center  in Los Angeles .

Chiara Giovando is an artist and curator. She has records released on Ehse Records, Holy Mountain and Ecstatic Peace. She has made several films including Proud Flesh, Archaic Smile and The Hen Knows What to Do. Her compositions have been performed at The Barbican in London, Los Angeles Philharmonic and apart of Southern Records Latitude series.
She plays Violin, guitar, voice and electronics.

Madelyn Villano is a Portland based musician, member of Smegma and solo project GUZO, she plays Violin, Voice and Electronics and enjoys the rich DIY community of Portland through performance and event planning. She has performed in Paris, London, Brussels, Newcastle, Lausanne and Vasteras.

Mia Ferm is a collective member and co-director of Cinema Project, a collectively run, non-profit organization based in Portland, Oregon, that works to promote public awareness of avant-garde cinema from the past and present through screenings, lectures, and events. Mia was a 2013 Andy Warhol Curatorial Fellow and is also an independent film curator, photographer, and musician.
DJ DNA is host of XRAY FM’s San Remo 1985 on Friday nights.