OBJECTS/INSTALLATIONS
Parhelia (Atelier Nord, 2016)
Parhelia is an audiovisual installation and performance work designed to pick up and represent a sound source from 10 different points simultaneously and in quick succession. It consists of 10 microphones with attached LED lights, and a controller program. The LEDs glow only when their corresponding microphones are in use.
Showcasing the spectral diffusion of a given soundsource (here: a cymbal) in a form of auditory cubism, this work is intended to make clear that a single point representation of an object is in fact a gross reduction of it. The narrow scope of each pickup point is here utilized as an instrument in itself.
Above: Excerpt from visual documentation of installation at Atelier Nord. Below: Audiovisual documentation of a performance version. Percussion played by Mathieu Lacroix.
Schizophonium
(Trøndelag Centre for Contemporary Art, 2015)
The installation Schizophonium explores separation of sound from its original source and acoustic environment - a phenomenon described as "schizophonia" by Dr. R. Murray Schafer. The installation consists of nine recordings of nine very different musical ensembles and solo musicians performing at different places at different times. Each ensemble was instructed to play one note only over a course of four to five minutes. Each recording is reproduced in the room by nine dedicated speakers and simultaneously transformed to 220V electric streams feeding nine fluroescent lighting tubes.
The fundamental idea is to show how the recordings - i.e. extracts of different times, situations and musical intentions - recontextualize each other and blend together to form new, supernatural structures.
The Composer
The Composer is a musical instrument intended to symbolize the compositional process, and, in extension, cultural development in general. It consists of 12 motorized music boxes, containing melodies such as Jingle Bells, Frere Jacques, The Internationale and I Did It My Way - cliches of the Western musical canon. I have used The Composer both in improvisation with direct control and as a standalone installation with algorithmic control. The idea is to recombine snippets of each melody into new phrases and chords. Much like in a visual collage, the different cut-outs take on new meanings and connotations as they contextualize each other. I see this process as analogous to traditional composition and other cultural practices, where the familiar - what else? - is deconstructed and rearranged to create new forms and patterns.
TOCK
The simple ticks and tocks of a mechanical clock are the basic building blocks of this composition. The clock's sound is captured by a contact microphone. It is then dramatically transformed through various forms of sampling, processing and synthesis.
All of the sounds in this piece are constructed in realtime from one or more ticks from the clock, The work is intended as a deep de- and reconstruction of the clock's mechanically driven acoustic output, questioning our culture's metric structuring of time.
SKIMR
SKIMR is a video projection system intended for live use in musical and theatrical contexts. It was created in an attempt to communicate the conflicting feelings experienced when seeing a corpse: The familiar human is only a fragile projection on inanimate, neutral matter. The stark contrast between the mask's statuses as subject and object interests me. I have used SKIMR with different faces, reciting text and singing.
Hammertime
Men i anna fall maa me verta trælane hans, og de er ikkje ein utveg som høver aat slike menn, som hev likso stort heidersnamn som Harald. Far min totte at de kaare var betre, aa falla i slage som konge, enn aa verta undermannen til kong Harald.» Solve tala for han so, at Audbjørn lova aa fara og drog ihop ein her og fór nordetter til kong Arnvid, og daa hadde dei ein ovende stor her. Dei spurde daa, at kong Harald var komin nordantil, og dei møttest innanfor Solskjel.