Audio Experimentation in the Visual Arts
Sound, Codes and Images reflected on the growth of audio experimentation in visual arts. From music scores, film, audio installation and multimedia projection, the exhibition aimed to visualize sound in shapes and colours, through acoustic objects and the mathematical concepts of sound. Some of the notable artists whose works were exhibited are pioneers of in experimental audio visual arts, including František Kupka, John Cage (Bauhaus) and Nam June Paik (Fluxus).
Setting the tone for the visit was the audiovisual installation Noisefield - Lights Revisited (1974-1988) by Woody and Steina Vasulka was a visualization of electronic signal and its energy. Colour films were positioned to form three projections out of a single video source, each alternating between colour and noise. Pavel Mrkus's Colours of Sound (2012) reacts to sounds in the gallery. The real time computer generated design changes its shape and colours according to various sound parameters.
Jiří Suchánek takes a go at visualizing sound through his cymatic laser sound installation, Red line border (2015). The laser light is caused by the vibration of the deep frequency bass tones transferred into the water tray. Only after reading the text the underlying message behind Suchánek's work. Created from abstract granularized fragments of political speeches, the sound affects the transformation of the red line (in diplomatic language signifies "no return in conflict"), symbolically dealing with the relativity, objectivity and complexity (Suchánek, 2015).
Speech, Robert Vlasák, (2015-2017), sound installation
Almost as if ghostly creatures were having conversations, the air bubbles rise and fall following the whispering voices in Robert Vlasák's Speech. The air bubbles resemble speech bubble in comics, inflating when the speakers they are connected to "speaks".
At the center of the space was what looked like an enormous record. Similar to the structure of a turntable, Robert Vlasák's installation, Tabula Rasa (2019), had four stylus riding around the spiraling disk (except this one doesn't have grooves), creating a mix of organic sounds. The other sound installations by Luboš Fidler were both interactive. Singing rods (1993 - 2019) consists of aluminium rods suspended in the air produced a spectrum of overtones (as illustrate on the wall) when audience hit them with a "beater", like playing a percussion instrument. On the other hand, the Dancing Spirit of the Trabant de Luxe (2011-2019) was not as obvious, a rod on a glass sitting on a pedestal did not seem so interactive to the audience. The glass sang when the gallery assistant rolled the metal rod, changing the reflection on the wall as it moves back and forth. Perhaps it was the way it was displayed, no one interacted with it even after the hint that it was interactive.
Most of the other works exhibited on the second floor were earlier audio visual artworks such as, music sheets, photographic documentations of conceptual art and video art with headphones.
On one wall hung what looked like a huge antique clock until the gallery assistant spun it. Light Score (1900s) by Fidler produce a low sound when rotated, with certain points illuminated when passed the fluorescent light behind. The installation turns into a score when rotated, the player was meant to play in accordance to the the lit up holes on the rotary dial.
Tomáš Hrůza's Table (2003) brings to mind Jaro Varga's We don’t know that we know in Hunt Kastner Gallery recently. Visitors were invited to scribble on the piece of paper on the desk, except this time the ultrasonic sensors turn the incomprehensible scribbles turn into music. It's interesting how the participants become composers even without any musical knowledge.
Michal Kindernay's Soundfield #2 (2019), a network of intertwined strings plays the invisible electromagnetic frequencies of electrical network and devices. Kindernay's work consistently on our relationships to nature and the position of the human individual in the landscape, which is most precisely characterised by sound recordings (Remesova, 2018).
Resonator, Martin Janíček, (2013) Cascade, Jiří Suchánek, (2019)
The loud clunks of pin balls that went down Jiří Suchánek's Cascade marked the end of the exhibition.
The exhibition showed the evolution of audiovisual arts, how technological advancement help create contemporary artistic expressions through manipulation of sound and image, defined as time-based, media-based, and performative.
Prague City Gallery
Photographs by Tan Sher Lynn
References
Carvalho, (2015). 'The Audiovisual Breakthrough' Available at: http://www.ephemeral-expanded.net/audiovisualbreakthrough/theaudiovisualbreakthrough_print2_download.pdf (Accessed: 13 October 2019)
Remesova, A. (2018) 'Together Towards Catastrophe – Czech and Slovak Contemporary Art and its Relation to Environmental Topics I.', artportal, December 5. Available at: https://artportal.hu/magazin/together-towards-catastrophe-czech-and-slovak-contemporary-art-and-its-relation-to-environmental-topics-i/ (Accessed: 13 October 2019)
Šorfa, J. (2019) 'The Island Summer Palace was enchanted by the wonderful light and sound structures', Český Rozhlas, June 7. Available at: https://vary.rozhlas.cz/ostrovsky-letohradek-ozvlastnily-podivuhodne-svetelne-a-zvukove-konstrukce-7958937 (Accessed: 13 October 2019)
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