MA/IN23: APPARITIONS#2

10 November 2023 @ 16:00 - 17:30

€ 2

© Ocean – Amanda Stuart

AUDIOVISUAL SESSION #2

PROGRAM
ore 16.00 / screening

Amanda Stuart [UK] /// Oceana
David Bird [US] /// What Glows is Fuchsia

Nicola Fumo Frattegiani [IT] /// Luar
Edmar Soria [MX] /// Homemorphism Phi(0)
Beth Walker [UK] /// Beneath

Amanda Stuart [UK] /// Oceana

As part of the “Polar Sounds” Project, I transformed a sample of Orcas and Ross Seal calls, recorded with hydrophones in the Antartic by the Alfred Wegener Institute (2022), into 61 different sounds to create an imaginary underwater soundscape. Orcas produce a variety of vocalizations eg. whistles, pulsed calls and echolocation clicks. I am fascinated how the reduction of anthropogenic noise pollution during the Covid pandemic allowed sea creatures to communicate again across much wider areas. I transformed fourteen of my paintings to create the seascape.I transformed fourteen of my paintings to create the seascape.Oceana begins in the depths of the water, submerged with pulsing sonar like sounds, building to rushing water and long haunting calls. (Original audio of the Orca and Ross Seals is heard at 1:15). More harmonious calls are heard before moving into a distant birdlike section. Strange noises of wailing and deep granular sounds move through the ocean. A storm builds and the turmoil leads to a dramatic climax which suddenly releases. Back down into the deepest part of the ocean, we are immersed in powerful rushing moaning sounds that dominate the seascape. Slowly rising up through the layers of the ocean, we are left gently floating into the wild blue yonder.

Amanda Stuart loves creating beautiful and dramatic soundworlds and landscapes. From the tiniest of gestures to powerful climaxes she uses narrative of form and shape, juxtaposing contrasting translucent colours with dense sonic textures, woven together in an audiovisual tapestry. In 2017 she was awarded her MMUS in Creative Music Technology from the Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama with Distinction. Her piece Song of the Trees won the IAWM Pauline Oliveros Prize for Electroacoustic Media 2015 and Not Missing You received an Honorary Mention for the same prize in 2014 (“It’s as beautiful to look at as it is to hear …”- Boston Classical Review). Performances include: Earth Day Art Model - IUPUI Indianpolis (3), New York Electroacoustic Music Festival(3), Sound/Image 22 Festival (Greenwich University), International Computer Music Conference (Perth), Understanding Visual Music (Buenos Aires), SMC/SMAC (Royal College, Stockholm), Boston New Music Initiative, IFIMPAC (Leeds). Previous posts include Performing Rights Society Composer in Education and Musician in Residence (Music Animateur) for the City of Peterborough, Composer in Residence for the Cambridge Festival. Commissions include compositions for the London Festival Orchestra (Composer in Residence - Cambridge Festival), The City of Peterborough Symphony Orchestra, BSkyB, Anglia TV and BT.

David Bird [US] /// What Glows is Fuchsia

"What Glows is Fuchsia" immerses members of the Strasbourg-based lovemusic collective in a dynamic virtual environment. In developing the work, lovemusic was asked to document a range of musical and non-musical tasks that reflected themes of loss, solitude, and dislocation. The media collected by the ensemble was assembled into a 3D scene where their audio and visual contributions interacted with one another and influenced the conditions of the virtual environment. "What Glows is Fuchsia" was created in isolation, yet it allows the separate performances and materials to coexist in a fluid and surreal virtual realm. Performed by Adam Starkie, Emiliano Gavito, Winnie Huang, Christian Lozano, Victor Hocquet, and Lola Maliq

David Bird is a composer, producer, and multimedia artist. His work explores the dramatic potential of electroacoustic and multimedia environments, often highlighting the relationships between technology and the individual. Bird's compositions have been performed at venues such as the Walt Disney Concert Hall and the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, as well as festivals including the Gaudeamus Festival, Wien Modern, MATA Festival, Musica Electronica Nova Festival, Festival Mixtur, and more. His work has been released on labels such as New Focus Recordings, Carrier Records, and TAK Editions, and has received praise from outlets such as The New York Times, The Wire, Textura, and "Best of Bandcamp."
Bird is a founding member of the New York-based chamber ensemble TAK and frequently collaborates with Qubit New Music, a non-profit group that curates and produces experimental music events in New York City. He is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor at the University of Chicago and has previously taught courses in composition and computer music at Columbia University, Hamilton College, and the Stevens Institute of Technology.

Nicola Fumo Frattegiani [IT] /// Luar

LUAR is the inexorable descent of the man within himself. A fall towards the most hidden places of his soul where the protagonist struggles with the multiple representations of the self. The primordial conflict of every individual fragmented in a horde of identities. The poetic and the words of poet Fernando Pessoa accompany this descent towards never-ending subjectivity, through the labour of existence which, in its own way, finds a resolution. LUAR is a Portuguese word that means ‘moon light’, the quintessential nocturnal light, the one and only light amongst the shadows, which allows to see the hidden side, in which the inner epiphanies emerge in their splendour, and cruelty.

Nicola Fumo Frattegiani is an electroacoustic and audio-visual composer living in Perugia, Italy. His works have been presented at various national and international festivals. Author and performer, his research deals with electroacoustic music, sound for images, video, art exhibitions and compositions for theatrical performances. He is a Subject Expert in "Electroacoustic" and “Computer Music” at the Conservatory of Music of Perugia.
He held the chair of Electroacoustic Music Composition at the Conservatory of Music of Messina.He is currently professor of Sound design at the Academy of Fine Arts in Macerata.

Edmar Soria [MX] /// Homemorphism Phi(0)

A homeomorphism also called a continuous transformation, is an equivalence relation and one-to-one correspondence between points in two geometric figures or topological spaces that is continuous in both directions. A homeomorphism which also preserves distances is called an isometry. Affine transformations are another type of common geometric homeomorphism. A common interpretation for homeomorphism is that is such topological property of geometric figures which can be transformed one into the other by an elastic deformation. In this sense, this work is an exploration of the possibilities of elastic deformation (from a topological metaphorical perspective) of sound into visual procedural geometries, i.e. an aesthetic proposal of sound translated into geometries and its integration as an hyperscore for a further guided improvisation. The core structure of the geometries were obtained through data visualization of sound analysis by MIR (Music Information Retrieval) from the previoulsy composed fixed media. This data (zcr, energy, MFCC, etc.) is then translated as graphs (or as arrays) into a 3D visual software (Blender) where it is transformed onto the visual shapes, textures and illuminations reactive dynamics.This is an aesthetic seek for alternative ways of integrate computer techniques and visual aesthetics into the language and statements of electroacoustic music, with an emphasis on rhythm and timbre developments where human - machine relationship constraints into an alternative aesthetic configuration.

He got a PhD. and a Master's degree in Music Technology from UNAM (Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico), a Bachelor's degree in Mathematics from the National Polytechnic Institute and a Master'sdegree in Applied Economics from UNAM. He is currently on a post-doctorate program on AI (Deep Learning). He is a research professor in the Department of Arts and Humanities at the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana - Mexico. Winner of the Acousmonium INA GRM-Fonoteca Nacional 2016 Competition (France-Mexico), got Third Prize at the Iannis Xenakis Electroacoustic Music Contest (2022), winner of the SONOM 2014 competition (International Sound Art Festival), finalist of the "Concours International de Composition Electroacoustique SIME 2018" (Lille, France). he has carried out artistic residencies at Musique & Recherches (Belgium), INA GRM (Paris, France), DXArts (Washington University), and Belo Horizonte (with Joao Pedro Oliveira).

Beth Walker [UK] /// Beneath

A meditation on growth, connection and symbiosis, inspired by the entangled lives of fungi. Made at the Royal College of Art using experimental analogue and digital techniques, this film takes us into a hidden world where edges blur, connection is vital, and life thrives through togetherness.