The Performing Audiovisualist » visual

Confirmation Excerpts#2 – What is AV Performance?

lb — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 04:01:57 +0000

Luma live at Gallery of Modern Art, Spoleto, Italy

AV is easily understood as Audio-Visual but as a defining term is as broad as Electronic music. Ian Andrews is a theorist and AV artist whose work as a member of Subvertigo VJ collective melded video surrealism with a playful activism present to this day throughout independent dance parties and cultural festivals like Electrofringe. He defines contemporary audio-visual art as a live performance practice that, while culturally informed by the parallel history of experimental and expanded cinema, is structurally and conceptually derived from developments in sound and musical practice through the twentieth century.

Although the terminology “audio-visual” suggests that sound and vision might share equal importance, AV derives its “language” from music. In most cases AV work is concerned with formal compositional structures, of time and rhythm, which are closer to music than to specifically cinematic or visual art codes. (Andrews, 2009)

While AV works may address the performing body, the narrative text, the image in motion or stasis and structural / spatial definitions both virtual and actual, a focus on the consistent application and deployment of repeatable patterns and structures separate AV from Theatre, Dance and Cinema. Media objects in AV work often consist, of looped sections of sound and vision, deployed in a structural pattern or stacked to form an audio-visual collage. As with electronic music performance, this structure allows the composer to direct their material towards a near infinite number of stylistic choices.

Contemporary audio and visual practice also share a material status; the electronic signal in wire, or data. (Andrews, 2009) Bill Viola concurs, stating in ‘Sound by Artists’ that the video camera “as an electronic transducer of physical energy into electrical impulses, bears a closer original relation to the microphone…” than the mechanical / chemical process of film. (Lander & Lexier, 1990, p. 49) This notion of transducence, a transfer from one energy form to another, is central to a definition of AV as it is a modern, digital practice where analogue input, no matter the form, is converted to data. The focus is placed on the signal, both the source and result of the data, not the performer, who engineers the real-time manipulation of aural and visual data into an output. This projected output is not merely the by-product of a mathematical process; it suggests a third signal, a communication signal or meaning. The source data can be pre-rendered and streamed or transformed and received in real-time and could be representative of anything at all. The Semiconductor duo use seismic data as a source for their “Earthquake Films” and “Strata” (2007) and Steina Vasulka has developed the performance work “Violin Power” over 30 years, with the constant source being that of her violin. The contextualisation of both works feature a visible or pre-empted demonstration of the specific transformative process. The source signal and resultant signal can also be looped into one another, in a feedback system similar to anyone who has pointed a video camera at a live monitor of itself. This trait has been explored and extended by Steina and Woody Vasulka in the 1970’s and in the present day with the closed circuit work of Botborg.

This focus on the transforming signal is another point of departure from related performative media; one that often problematises the nature of AV performance. Weiß contends that the “…narrow contemporary definition [of visual music]… emerges live in public venues” and is not a product of the studio. Where audiences identify a performance by the movement of performers, an expectation is readily shattered when the focus of performance is not a human body, but a transforming signal. The clash between embodied and disembodied modes of performance exists also for the live “electronic” musician and some AV performers employ musical controllers as performative enhancements, in order to extend their ability to transform the signal, and as a way of physicalising their interactions for the audience. The video itself has been used as a way of distancing the performer from traditional performance as well. Via email correspondence Tom Ellard explains: the “visuals distracted from the people on stage. We were against people looking at us ‘performing’ which seemed a bit ‘rock’.”

Perhaps the closest cousin to AV performance is that of the Video Jockey or VJ. Arising alongside the growth of Rave culture, they share a parallel history and many artists, like Tom Ellard, cross over between modes. They certainly share a number of performative elements and the emphasis on improvisation in VJ form has moved the form towards sophisticated use of musical and non-musical controllers, controlling the construction of pseudo-narrative texts in an emergent form that is evolving away from its DJ origins, towards ‘Live Cinema’.

At this point the primary distinction is that AV performance has its foundation in live and composed audio practices, and in the manipulation of sound and video objects. Ian Andrews contends that VJs are concerned with a visual foundation and the interaction their visuals have with a DJ or predefined musical track. As a performance practice it draws less from musical practice than from live broadcast television; the original VJ movement sourced their gear from discarded remnants of broadcast Video editing equipment. The influences stem not so much from Cage, Varese or Wagner but from the work of video artists, like Nam June Paik and the Vasulka’s, who also contributed to the development of various enhancements in broadcast television including the use of video synthesisers as a means of generating motion graphics.

Confirmation Excerpts#1 – I am an Audio-visualist

lb — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 03:41:45 +0000

AKA: the position of researcher

It may have something to do with my age; I hit my teens in the late ‘80s and at that time I was obsessed, not specifically with music, but with music video, in particular a show on the ABC network, ‘Rage’. Every Friday and Saturday night I would set a VCR to record in extended play, as much of the show as would fit. From these recordings I would isolate the artists to obsess over, for their image not just their song.

In ‘Timeshift: on visual culture”(1991) Sean Cubitt states that “music video is heir to both the referential qualities of music and older visual elements of performance and spectacle.” (p. 46) This world of the MTV cliché held more magic than a glimpse at the rock ‘n roll lifestyle. I witnessed micro-narratives, identities deconstructed, puzzling imagery and a number of hotel rooms trashed. In the article ‘Images of performances, Images as performances. On the (in-) Differentiability of music video and visual music’ Markus Weiß describes the development of music video as an economic move by the music industry “…intended to replace costly live appearances.” (2009) Considering the relative lack of critical dialogue on the influence of music video in AV performance, one might consider them merely a form of advertising, unworthy of reflection, yet they “…can also be seen as a kind of televisual music theatre” (Ibid). The mythologising of both artist and practice is a recurrent feature of music video assisted by broad cultural sampling and trans-media referencing. The location of a popular music artist within their field is an evolving identity, distinct from reality. The combination of sound and vision projected a vision of the artist as beyond regular humanity, conflating them with the stars of Hollywood, in ways lavish and gritty, garish and mysterious. Of the recurrent directors, many refuges from the experimental cinema and video scene established an occasional payday, like Derek Jarman and Bruce Connor. There work would help bring what was avant-garde into more mainstream acceptance, and in works like Bruce Connor’s video for Devo, ‘(It’s A) Beautiful World’ that we see a clear example of the way sound and vision, in juxtaposition, can draw out a deeper, more satisfying meaning.

When thinking about the representation of sound, a question I ask myself (and others) is “what does this sound make me (think I) see?” The consideration that sound might inspire the imagination towards iconic identification is a theme extrapolated from Richard Wagner’s theory and application of the leitmotif, a repeated musical phrase associated with a person, place or idea. Where synaesthesia is the by-product of a specific neurological condition, audio-visual syncretism is a learned perceptive ability more readily connected to cultural objects. As John Whitney describes in ‘Digital Harmony’ (1980):

Some visualise… descriptive images while others falter with literal “realities”; associating music with images of conductor, performer, opera star, rock star – even the occasionally lurid images of pop music lyrics. (p. 14)

The connections are not arbitrary; they are culturally defined, relating to the tacit knowledge accumulated from years of exposure to integrated media.

Via email correspondence, Ian Andrews explains further that “when images and words come into music… that changes everything. There is the possibility of meaning, the opportunity to say something, or not say something. One can either take up that challenge or retreat into hermetic abstraction.” (2010) In my history of making what is now comfortably called “Sound Art”, I’ve always been more concerned with the images and thoughts that a piece of music might conjure; the possibility for meaning, if not a direct statement of intent; than notion of pitch, duration or tonality. I see myself as a primarily visual musician, composing works with texture, colour, language, and imagery in preference to pitches and durations.

“Let’s Hear It For The Vague Blur” stills

‘Let’s hear it for the Vague Blur’, created with Joe Musgrove as the outfit Diaspora (2004) began life as a fairly solid 40-minute soundscape; yet we felt it needed a different trajectory than a de-rigueur release on CDR only to then disappear into the file-sharing aether to be forgotten. Together we constructed imagery of an Abstract Expressionist nature that would suggest without leading audience interpretation. Originating with a series of stills generated by ‘GoogleSynth’, a program that creates mashed pixel-scapes from one or more images sourced through Google’s image search function, we then motion-tracked across the results in an animation style similar to the use of a Rostrum camera setup in documentaries. The slow moving, blurry mess of colours when synced to the soundscape was intended to emulate a hypnagogic state, the point between wakefulness and sleep where abstract hallucinations are often projected on the back of one’s eyelids. As the video screened at a number of festivals in Australia and abroad, we started receiving audience reports asking us to confirm their individual narratives. Many of these narratives, as retold by different audience members, possessed a startling similarity, outlining what could be an example of the cultural form of AV communication. Absent of the traditional structure and content of a preset language, we had unwittingly created a cryptographic cinema that substitutes narrative for a linguistic puzzle. Musical sounds, associated with visual symbols for the audience, producing a meaning that is neither exclusive to sight nor sound but to what Michel Chion, in Audio Vision (1994) calls “transensoriality” (p. 136). From this point on, my work has invariably used or referenced transensoriality in some form. Be it the composed sound of a film without actors on the Room40 CD release, ‘Mise En Scene’(2006); the construction and use of artificial life algorithms for real time AV composition; or the continued experiments into hypnagogic syncretism through the N4rgh1l3 AV performance duet with Andrew Thomson (see below).

N4rgh1l3 @ Wireless Imagination 2009

My place within this research is, as a sound artist, working with predominantly visual ideas. I’m interested in exploring effective modes and approaches to audio visualisation and see integrated digital AV performance as a vital alternative to traditional engagements with sound and image. I believe this field could certainly approach the kind of universality that Whitney aspired to, but that it currently lacks direction is down to critical dialogues concerned with the parts of AV and not the sum total of the performative experience. My research is therefore focused on the construction of a typology for audiovisual performance that demonstrates, reflects and explains the nature of current practice, through a consideration of the divergent influences on the hybrid field with respect to successful approaches deployed by active practitioners.

Soisong – How Live Is Live

lb — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 00:33:40 +0000

Some interesting stuff posted online recently from and about Soisong; an AV group consisting of Peter (Coil, Throbbing Gristle, Psychic TV) Christopherson and Ivan (COH) Pavlov.

Firstly some bootleg video recorded at their recent Cologne gig.

It’s worth checking out the rest of that gig (there are 8 parts). The video/sound integration errs on the cinematic side, to my mind referencing Dziga Vertov’s “Man With A Movie Camera” and films inspired by this (like Koyaanisqatsi) in the rhythmic editing of didactic / rhetorical material. Where people like Robin Fox, Botborg and Ryoji Ikeda are concerned with a direct synaesthetic connection, here the cognitive connection between sound and image is explored (see also Rechenzentrum) and the audio and visual aesthetic is subsequently raised in importance (the grainy, over saturated 16mm look screams late ’70s to me.) Interesting to note Peter Christopherson’s work with Hipgnosis and as a video clip director for hire.

In reponse to some audience member falsely concluding that their material was delivered from a DVD (it’s HD triggered by PC), Soisong have posted some communiques about their live practice here.

Of particular note, from Ivan:

…the more entertaining the performers themselves are, the less “live” their show is likely to be, for in order to be able to perform all those entertaining tricks, the actual musical playing of the instrument has to be polished and rehearsed to be nearly automatic.. In the end, in most cases the audiences end up watching a dancing sampler on the stage…

and from Peter:

I believe that the former view automatically cuts out more or less all the interesting music being made today (mostly with the help of computers) which actually cannot be played at all in the conventional sense… The most important thing for me, is that I try to put over the excitement and wonder I felt when first conceiving of the music and the image, to a live audience in a fresh and individual way each night….

I’m definately going to try and procure an interview with these fellows.

Towards a Definition of The Performing Audiovisualist

lb — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 23:15:50 +0000

TDPAV_revision2_submit_candidate

There it is… my first paper. Delivered to the Australasian Computer Music Conference in August 2009 and published as part of the proceedings.

Three months on I see it as not so much a proof of concept as it is an evocation of the reason for a program of research on the nature of audiovisual performance in the now.

It is a confused document, lurching through the centuries making disparate links here and there between different media forms and approaches. Well this is the point!

At the moment we have an excess of example with few historical threads to link the divergent approaches.

Yet the grant funded artist uses fundamentally similar tools as the underground noise musician.

What similarities exist between Peter Greenaway’s live Tulse Luper (remix) project and what Scott Sinclair is achieving through his Company Fuck performances?

I’m going to delve into both in further blog posts – don’t want to peak too early.

Just thought i’d say for now – these new opportunities are riding on centuries of live art and decades of performative research. As the technology becomes more utilitarian, so the approaches to the use of technology in performance become more interesting. This is where I believe the story is. There is little “new” about any of this, but now many more artists are encouraged to develop a synchresis of sound and vision, a dual mode dialogue that may hopefully assist in doing the one thing that artists throughout the centuries have attempt to do – communicate.

In my solo AV practice i’m learning how to do this more effectively – and I plan to make many mistakes – generate all the tedious and pointless novelty examples of AV inclusion possible – in order to strive for a greater unity of expression. Learning to fail and learning to learn from that failure.

Just before signing off on this quick (and incredibly late) post – I’d like to say that the following video is a pretty evocative example of AV that is both engaging and embodied while demonstrating a level of practiced skill that used to (in theory) signify the value of a live performer. Something that Quartz Composer patches don’t tend to really bring to a performance.

How to design a digital media instrument with such expressability?

Performance Experiments Phase1: Surrogate Band

lb — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 00:24:45 +0000

Surrogate Band from Performing Audiovisualist on Vimeo.

A super early version of what could be considered granular video inspired by:

Granular Synthesis;
granular synthesis;
Phil Niblock’s Magic Sun film of Sun Ra;
Kutiman;
and the “Say No More” projects of Bob Ostertag.

Compositional Approach:

My goal was to create a performance system that could be ‘played’ more readily than most source-material centric AV works. Referencing the “Surrogate Band” concept used by Pink Floyd in The Wall (in the handful of original live concerts they opened with a fake Pink Floyd band hidden behind masks) the initial idea was to mix together sound/image of improvisers to form a cohesive piece. The work comments on some of the issues with audiovisual (particularly laptop) performance by recontextualising the gestures musicians employ in the generation of spontaneous sound as a writhing, sound activated collage. Real-time control of captured footage creates a dialogue with the “tense” of performance – the “now” that is “then” becomes a new “now” through the ability to improvise with arbitrary sequences channelled through a simple control mechanism / compositional system that defines the work.

Ok so enough blather… how does it work?

Performative Framework:

VDMX and Audiomulch

I found Isadora too slow to work with the source material in an incisive fashion and chose VDMX for its flexibility and Audiomulch to feed sound through two ‘dlgrains’ granular objects. As evidenced by the above screen grab, VDMX windows can be positioned to allow access to windows behind… important as I needed to see the dlgrains settings. The videos are step sequenced in VDMX and I have control (via NanoKontrol) of the speed and direction of the files. Mouse pointer is only used to change the step sequence, a series of key presses were programmed to cycle through the source footage. Video files were rendered with audio as photo jpeg 640×360 @ 59.94fps in order that I could slow the footage and still maintain quality – i’ve yet to experiment with whether this makes any perceivable difference. Sound from the videos was routed, via Soundflower, to the two dlgrains objects in Audiomulch. Unfortunately VDMX does not solve the problem of selective routing of audio from video files that plagues Isadora. So a stereo output is sent which is then split in mulch and returned as 4 mono signals. These signals are sent to the Audio Analysis tools in VDMX which are used to define the opacity of videos on each of the four layers. Sound then carries out to the PA by forwarding the analysed sound through from the AA tools to the soundcard. This can also be achieved by ‘listening’ to Soundflower output.

Thoughts:

On some levels (and at this early stage) the work has achieved all I wanted. Issues at this stage:

need more footage / performers for greater variety;
less need to control the dlgrains in real time as this is difficult to do – perhaps setting the metasurface in audiomulch to a series of recorded positions (value snapshots) which can then be interpolated between by connecting an x/y touch surface (either one of the iPhone OSC apps or the KP3 Kaosspad);
research the ability for similar value snapshots to be set in VDMX to streamline the change of materials;
consider implementing framework in Max5 / Jitter in order that a direct link between control data and audio can be made – also may allow for audio to be separated more effectively (having to reinstall Max5 as it seems I have only 3 Jitter objects… is this correct?)
without overcomplicating, ability to change transitions and layer opacities to vary the interaction between videos from a collage effect to other..?
I’ve been informed that Andrew Sorenson’s Impromptu may provide the ability to analyse and batch cut videos to make each sequence less arbitrary – this could be very useful as the “granularisation” of the video becomes more in depth;
provide some kind of data structure (based perhaps on histogram analysis) of the “energy” of both sound and image that can be interpreted and used within the performance.

When i’ve fine tuned this system I would like to put it to work as a live improvisation tool in sessions and performances with some of the improvisors I have recorded.

Next up… N4rgh1l3 and the balance of “art”, music and context.

Performance Experiments Phase1: Left of Left

lb — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 07:38:12 +0000

“Barrett’s set, for example, explores a very intriguing, almost linear, narrative from blurry, sun-kissed photography and warm spacious ambience to the subdued loneliness of melancholic imagery and trilling feedback before finally collapsing into a dark, droning portrait of utter desolation. Barrett orchestrates the imagery well with a blend of abstract sound, field recordings and live instrumentation intermingling throughout but there is a certain gracelessness to the transitions between tones that prevents the performance from the reaching the heights it should.” Matt O’Neill – Time Off

Yes there were technical difficulties… but i digress…

Left of Left performance

The Setup:

A couple of months prior to this performance Tom Hall approached me with the idea for Lawrence and I to join him on the closing night of his installation for mixed AV performances. The catch would be that we needed to use or approach his material, though it was up to our individual tastes to do this as we wished.

About one month prior to the performance I received around 20gb worth of source material from Tom to start playing with…

The Compositional Approach:

My approach was to work in a similar fashion to the way I have remixed sound for other artists; a somewhat subtractive fashion; therefore my influences were pretty close to home. I wanted to simultaneously convert Tom’s footage to something more indicative of my own tastes, while maintaining an individual style / aesthetic that carried from image to sound and vice versa. I made numerous passes of the source material through Isadora using Blends and Luma Key filters to reduce the visual elements to minimalist flecks of colour on black that would, in theory, mix well together.

As I was also experimenting with a Rutt Ettra simulation in Quartz Composer at the time I thought it would be appropriate experiment with the Z-Depth and zooming abilities to create depth in the compositions.

I also visited the installation during the day to obtain footage of the curtains which create an interesting visual simulation of the actual installation when blended with the other footage.

Ultimately I rendered out about 2hrs of prepared footage which would then be reduced to 3o mins of possible footage for the performance and sorted in 4 distinct pieces that would flow one to the other.

Sound was linked to the vision semantically (relating the sounds to whatever the image denoted) or symbolically (whatever I felt the image signified or connoted.) A large percentage of the sound was generated by watching the footage and applying different values to a Waldorf Blofeld synthesiser until an appropriate correlation developed. The sequences were then cut and connected to the prepared footage in Final Cut Express and rendered out as 640×360 (16:9) photo jpeg files to be mixed with in Isadora during the performance.

As a platform for doing strange things to video Isadora is somewhat peerless. Modules are connected one to the next in a similar fashion to Max/MSP (but not at quite as low level) or Audiomulch work with audio. As a performance tool there are some issues to overcome, particularly the inability for the video files to loop cleanly, something that works much better in programs like Resolume and VDMX. In Isadora this can be worked around by using a loop patch put together by Fred Vaillant, however this takes over control of volume/opacity (something I needed control of) and requires files of more than 10secs length to work as, is. So I hacked this patch for my performance and it didn’t quite work as the use of volume/opacity to trigger the envelopes does not work consistently for a reason i’ve yet to completely fathom (though I produce a more stable version for the N4rgh1l3 performance which will be reported on in one of the following blogs.)

The Performance:

curtains, lights from Performing Audiovisualist on Vimeo.

As you can see Tom did a great job setting up the space with curtains and three projectors. With regards to my material, the level of light coming in from the windows was somewhat problematic for my very dark footage and the quick addition of a gamma corrector brightened the footage but also reduced detail to horrible pixellated blocks. The main problem was not so much the video as it was the issue with seemingly random volume spikes (not that obvious in the selected footage but that is the only footage I would want to keep) and a rather jerky set of controls that made it easy for me to accidently turn audio/video layers on/off but not so easy to smoothly blend them.

So the reviewer calling the performance “graceless” is accurate. This was not a live setting where I really mattered how live I was, except when it was obvious that I was screwing up. Even with the bright Notebook light it was quite difficult to tell which buttons on the NanoKontrol I was hitting. In fact it is something of a miracle I got a performance as good as what is recorded above – I place my faith in drones!

The audience was very supportive but I was very disappointed as I felt like my good intentions/inventions were wasted on an unreliable control setup and a screen that made it difficult to actually see my work. So I thought i’d recreate the pieces at home in our downstairs laboratory. Here are two examples of what it was supposed to look like:

Magic Lanterns from Performing Audiovisualist on Vimeo.

Crush from Performing Audiovisualist on Vimeo.

The first is a great example of the Rutt Etra at work, splitting and abstracting depth in the image. The second is some Data Moshing of Tom’s material with some of my recent (similarly drifting) footage that I did not get to reproduce live due to the technical difficulties and time constraints.

Thoughts:

The audience and context for this work was pretty-much perfect (as opposed to the following performances which I will discuss in later blogs) with the only real issue being that of the rear-light projection coming from the street. Now I do recall Tom mentioning that he would close the blinds for the final gig – and this was the assumption I was composing my parts for. What does one do as a performer when this situation arises? Accept and adapt or demand a more appropriate setup. I certainly feel that I’ve been through many a gig where I left unhappy with my performance in part due to the setup being inconsistent with my perforative goals. I’ve put curated enough performances to know that some artists pride themselves in their stubborn demand for a checklist of contextual settings. Working closely with the Other Film group I’ve seen first hand how variable the goalposts are, particularly with expanded cinema that often exists only within a prescribed setup. In order to further expand on the flexibility, sustainability of AV performance I guess, in the end it would’ve been better to reorganise my setlist to focus on the brighter material. I certainly am not the type to pick hairs when i’ve been invited to perform at someone else’s installation.

While the conceptual framework was simple, the construction of my performance interface left a lot to be desired. In an effort to devise a system that would allow direct control of all elements, I failed to consider how much control I needed and how few hands I had. In the end it would not have hurt to automate a few more processes, especially given that the audience was staring around my arse and could not have seen any of the micro-gestures employed. Did the gracelessness of the performance, and the failure of some material to trigger as intended, demonstrate that I did have live control? If so, did the audience really care? Based on the review I feel that it might have been better to provide more of an illusion of control; all the better for the smoother performance that the material required. Given that the interface was finalised about 4 hours before the performance, i guess I can’t expect miracles. It would be like learning a chord in order to play it in front of an audience without any form of practice. But worse

It wasn’t all bad news though – bad gigs at this point in my research are… well… good research – or at least points of contention for me to bust through. So i need a more fluid interactive surface and more experience with solo manipulation of both audio and video in real time – with perhaps a small amount of automation / puppeting – enough to keep the performance smooth but interesting. At very least I got a decent eyeful of Tom Hall’s VDMX setup, a program that seems to work more seamlessly in a live context (at least with regards to what I am trying to do here and now.) I promptly bought a copy and successfully deployed it in the next live scenario to be discussed…

Addendum:

Just read a review of Liquid Architecture in Sydney by Tom Ellard. Particularly interested in his comments on Thomas Koner:

Last up was a German fellow, because the Goethe Institute sure seems able to pay for stuff. He was making a soundtrack for an unseen film, something a lot of sound students do because you can get a bunch of location recordings and play dramatic music underneath which hides your music inside Sound Art. Anyway his location recordings were pretty good and the film music was alright so I settled back into my snooze for a while. But on peeping I found he’d started showing video.

Now once you’re showing video you’re no longer doing the ‘unseen film’ – you’re bound by the same rules as any other soundtrack maker – relevance/resonance with the screened image. There wasn’t much. On screen we arrived at train stations in London in slow motion plus a difference layer in After FX. It looked quite nice for the first 5 minutes, after that, not so much. Sonically there was increasing layers of squoonsch – desperate really, as if squoonsch was the special sauce of Sound Art. That lost my interest.

What I learned: drones are the coward’s tool. Spurn drones.

Some interesting points: when he played in Brisbane Andrew T and I spent most of the performance trying to catalogue his approach (we reckon multiple similar layers, some inverted and shifted, definately difference opacity.) But spurn drones? Come on Tom, I know Drones are kinda lazy, easy to mix with and synchronise with footage, but they are also the foundation of much of my compositional work and the work I chose to listen to. Applied with footage have worked with material from Phil Niblock to the Hafler Trio, but some consideration should be made to how they are used in those circumstances avoiding blanket statements. In particular i’m interested in the eyes shut trance state that drone music implies, how the inner cinema is broken by the combination of drones with vision and ways that this can be applied for good reason instead of novelty or laziness.

Performance Experiments Phase1: introduction

lb — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 05:06:47 +0000

Well howdy!

Over the next three years I will periodically demonstrate my findings through a number of live audiovisual performance experiments, documenting my approaches and related issues.

The phases are as follows:

addressing my background in composition and performance and current approaches;
addressing the literature and assimilating theoretical concepts into performance practice;
addressing the case studies / approaches and concerns of other audiovisualists;
exhibition of works and findings.

Documentation will be uploaded to VIMEO for each phase and will be used to elaborate on blog postings discussing the likes of:

compositional and performative approaches;
audience and context
comparative works and inspiration;
technological affordances and impact;

plus whatever else seems relevant at the time.

So the first phase matched up with:

a performance as part of Tom Hall’s “Left of Left” exhibition at the Judith Wright Centre in Brisbane;

Left of Left performance poster c/o Tom Hall

two performances and the presentation of my paper at the Australasian Computer Music Conference 2009 here in Brisbane.

Australasian Computer Music Conference 2009 - conference.acma.asn.au

Here is the first phase worth of video material which I will discuss in the next few blogs. Get acquainted and I’ll be back soon with a post about the Left of Left performance.

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