yr 3 term 2

Intention for this term: push sound/combine drawings with sound - create a close link between the two/go larger scale, use sound for its immersive impact/figure out this balance, importance of everyday, familiar-ness within an art context

Testing ideas in 'Concrete Picnic', exhibition in Liverpool

The aim for the work in Concrete picnic was to expand on the sound pieces I'd made last term and start developing a style of drawing that could work with sound. I was interested in Jez Riley French's idea of 'scores for listening' (https://jezrileyfrench.co.uk/scores-for-listening---photographic-scores.php), as they act as a kind of guide for the listener, they help you engage with the sounds a little more closely. His 'scores' are funny because they are photographs, and I'm not sure I get them all, but the title got me thinking about how to create 'ways in' for audiences. 'Ways in are important!!!'. So I started playing about with drawing shapes that I think match the sounds, thinking about two things; 1. John Cage's approach to noticing the behaviour of sounds, so listening intently to notice patterns, forms or their inherent structures, and 2. almost characterising sounds, so that I could imagine them as a more tangible form. It's important to emphasise that I'm not trying to fake a synaesthetic process, but devise my own interpretation of something to help an audience.

Why use the drawings? Are they relevant? Does the sound need the drawing? DOES IT WORK...

At the moment, I view the drawings and sound as essential to be together. The sound is a kind of trickery because it distorts the original source, but leaves enough to be recognisable so that you can recognise it if you really try and listen; breaking down that barrier between hearing and listening, passive and active engagement with the senses. On the contrary, the drawings then act as a help tool. Compositionally made up of shapes and forms that relate to the sounds, they are composed is such a way that is not linear, so unlike a traditional music score where you can easily follow the timing. The aim is to create a visual flow, and encourage the eyes to move around a bit and search for a shape/bit of text that relates to the sound you might be listening to at a particular point.

After the exhibition opening, when friends/family had seen my work, I got some feedback which was really useful. I hadn't explained how the drawings' function, but people seemed to think it worked and noticed this without me saying... so that's positive! At least I have a base to work from now.

Where next?

larger scale - think sound is good for that - immersive - fill a space

Sound art and Communism

I was having a chat with Andy the other day, and I kind of came up with this little analogy between sound art and society. I feel like like there's a link between sound art and communism... kinda. We're hardly a socialist society, and as Marx said to achieve true communism we need socialism first. I feel like there's a link here with how we engage with our senses. We live in such a visual/ocular-centric society with mass capitalism marketing/advertising constantly in our faces etc. that we've almost lost touch with less familiar senses. So just like it would be a real effort to achieve true communism (not saying that's what I want), I think it would be a real effort to concentrate on listening - the link here is the attitude shift. I guess I'm trying to make efforts, or make it my responsibility to give aids or 'ways in' that can help the listening process.

MOVEMENT

I started to learn some animation to make the drawings move, but I think that the sound creates the movement and the drawings work well as a fixed composition. I guess I was thinking of the end goal and the visual aesthetic in an installation room if there were moving drawings projected. But, the drawings work as they are and the sound fills a space with a sense of movement... keep going with this

STEFANIE BLUM

installations, why?

specific artwork: verschachtelt (nested)

http://spindlemagazine.com/2016/11/student-spotlight-stefanie-blum/

reflections & interesting parts from this conversation...

"What compels you to create installations – what is it about this form you like?"

"Installations negotiate between sculpture and space. They are experienced physically and spatially. To me that’s exciting; where body and architecture encounter each other and what kind of experience that may be. It also gives me endless opportunities to take into account the particular exhibition space and reflects that I tend to work for specific occasions. That’s my playground and field of experimentation."

"We showed physical art works as well as a text piece each, negating the divide between theory and practice"

---

"What has been the most valuable thing you’ve learnt on your course?"

"The course has helped me get rid of even more of my personal understanding of what kind of art I make. Forgetting what I tend to do and instead try out new things and experiment."

-> really valuable thing to do: allow your mind to be changed - I never thought I'd work with technology when I started this course because I used to hate technology lol. I've totally changed my stance on that because now I see how influential and important it is to society and culture, it defines how we think (arguably) and act (again, arguably) and has such a massive impact on almost everything we encounter in our daily lives, so why not use it? I think I used to think that it made processes easier because it meant that the artist didn't have as much control, but I was so wrong. I guess my relationship to technology changed as well as my understanding of its purpose. I can see now how it has enriched many artist's creative processes and helps our understanding of contemporary life.

Drawing

Materiality - Materials

- Design & Function

A lot of people seem to think my work is about materiality... I get that quite a lot. It's got me thinking. I've always been quite concerned about the fact that I don't want my work to rely too heavily on materials for materiality sake - it clearly works for some people, and that's fine as it's the central concept for some. But I think perhaps, if work becomes to focussed on materials then it opens up a huge question for me about 'what is art for?'. I regularly try to critique myself by asking what's the point when making things, and I guess I take a slight issue when work becomes introverted and about itself; not to offend a whole section of art, it's just what does and doesn't work for me in my practice. I like to think of art having a place in society in the fact that it can teach, encourage, change/challenge viewpoints in diplomatic ways. Basically, what sort of wider impact can it have, other than the art thing itself, however big or small the impact might be.

HOWEVER... I'm not totally disregarding the importance of materials in art. I do think they're very important, it just depends on how they're used. Personally, I like to think of materials in terms of a design aesthetic as well a function. Creating ways in for audiences is something I constantly think about, and I think it's important with art that is abstract in its nature. So yes, materiality probably makes up a big chunk of my practice, but it's not everything.

It's always interesting when you meet strangers and they ask what you do and you eventually get into answering their questions about what it is you do at uni. I often try to explain an interdisciplinary course and why this approach is important. I think people often assume art students would specialise as a painter, drawer, sculptor etc.. I was also once asked "oh, so you're a jack of all trades, master of none?" My answer to that is no, I try to think about materials (and now technology) conceptually and use this way of thinking as a transferrable skill that can be applied to any sort of material or process that I think fits the topic I'm dealing with at the time.

Aesthetics

dark spaces - low lights - lots of negative space - concentrated areas of detail - subtleties - intangible forms - fine mark-making

This year, I'm starting to realise there is a running theme in terms of my aesthetic that has kept cropping up throughout studying these last 3 years. The aesthetic I like is definitely influenced by my thoughts on materiality just mentioned, but further than that, it's been interesting noticing the similarities which keep unintentionally popping up even though I've brought a new medium into my practice. My drawings have always been full of negative space with small patches of detail, I think this relates to the processes I usually use, but for me it also signifies thoughtfulness, i.e. these marks are purposeful because they have been placed in such a way, not just a bunch of random shapes and lines that have been plonked down.

Drawing -> Sound

I am now beginning to realise a similarity and significance of the use of negative spaces in my sound works - just thinking aesthetically for a moment. There always seems to be lots of long pauses or sustained sounds which I think link to this visual white space on paper and the long sounds are intermittently interrupted or layered with shorter sharper sounds, almost like punctuations to the auditory experience. I never set out with this intention to make the sounds match my drawings in that sense, it kind of happened unconsciously which is why I am starting to think that there might be an even deeper relevance to this aesthetic. Maybe this is where it starts to get a bit too deep, but it's worth thinking about for now I think, maybe I'll evaluate it as irrelevant later on anyway. But I was thinking how throughout my life, not so much now (this last year) I've always been in an environment where taking a moment out for peace and calm has been encouraged. At school, church, home we would often take time for prayers, and then when I stopped going to church, we still did the whole prayer thing at homes, but I took up meditation in sixth form so I had another way of inserting a moment or two of calm a day. I don't know... maybe not... but what if subconsciously these aesthetic choices I've been talking about are related to that?

-who is the author/who is the comsumer? and who has the responsibility for what one sees? - social dimension in moving that border - who decides what reality is? - thinking about the relationship between artwork and consumer

- Tate Turbine space - making a tangible space - mirror, people see themselves - how do we configure relationship between body and the space? - does it matter if you are in the world or not - actions and decisions taken by artist hold a responsibility to determine that

- art can evaluate the relationship of this: thinking and doing

- falling waterfall piece was able to give an idea of a sense of distance and time within a space: he talks about the fact that watching water fall from such a height gives you sense of how large/the scale of the sculpture is - interesting way of playing with space, especially within a context that would be so familiar to city people, you might not be so aware of your own space and place in relation to a place - maybe city time exists in a bit of a bubble with the very individual way of life (walking around with headphones, not making eye contact, fast self-checkouts, lack of meaningful communication) etc, maybe that alters perception of time in such a way - then this falling water sculpture totally cuts through each individual's perception of time and displays a new concept of time; a notion of time outside that individual bubble floating around a big city

- sense of consequences

- making space accessible (outdoors)

- ways of linking thinking and doing - what connects the two? - EXPERIENCE - how can you allow for that to happen in art - inclusivity, sense of ownership within a space: public can imagine the space, not totally determined by artist

TED talk

Olafur Eliasson:

Playing with space and light

sound as sculpture

and tech ethics

It’s been really interesting thinking of sound in a new way this term. I’ve had a lot of discussions in the studios and in Sultan’s about what sculpture can be. I’m interested in artists who think this way about drawing and setting it free from its traditional boundaries, and I’ve been trying to think about sound in a similar way. A friend said how they think of text as a sculpture, and when I had a tutorial with another friend about my work, he picked up on how I was speaking about sound very sculpturally. I guess I always was, but never actually put a label on it as sculpture. Giving form to something intangible seems the wrong way round, but I think it creates an interesting slight tension.

I think of Olafur Eliasson’s light works as sculpture, in the way that they fill a space and have a presence within the space. Perhaps that’s a wider thought for sculpture, it’s presence in a space/how it alters your engagement or sense of familiarity with a space - meaning that a lot of things can now be thought os as sculpture: smell? tastes? other senses….?

It’s also been interesting thinking sculpturally about sound throughout the audio editing process. There’s that quote by Michelangelo, I can’t remember off the top of my head, but something about how he didn’t carve the form out of the marble, but the form emerges: “Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it”. When experimenting with the audio files in Audition, by playing about with EQ and pitch for example, you can bring up hidden sounds and rhythms that are embedded, underlying the main audible sounds within the bass frequencies. It’s that same principle of ‘carving out’. On top of this, I’ve found borderlands a very useful and appropriate tool for sound editing. It’s dead easy to use, so I’m not trying to make it sound like a really hard tool to use, but because if the live playback, you can carefully control the effects and movements of the granular synthesis balls over certain sections of the sound waves. Like a sculptor does with their tools.

However, as good as all this technology is, there is an issue I became aware of this weekend when reading Grayson Perry’s ‘Playing to the Gallery’. He talked about how artists used to be the real pioneers and innovators of technology, I love that analogy he gives; if Michelangelo were alive today he would be working in CGI not painting! But he also says that art struggles to keep up with the advancements of technology. It made me think though, I don’t want my art to hide behind a facade of technology, I don’t want art to rely on technology to be good. This is why I think it’s important to think conceptually about materials and technology. I can’t make these amazing new soft/hardwares, and I also don’t think it’d be right to use them in the easiest way possible to achieve the easiest effects, because I do think that software engineers kind of do half the job for us in making the technology accessible. I think there’s a bit of a responsibility to take what has been provided and work with it in new ways, i.e. applying a framework of thinking around the technology where it balances out the ideas; like a harmonious relationship between art and technology where they both rely on each other just as much to make the art good? … perhaps this balances out this issue a bit?

Approach to Research

Upon reflection, I think last year, I really did that annoying thing where at certain times I tried to big up the art I made by using philosophy. Now, I think it's wrong to use philosophy to justify art, and it took me a while to realise that it is important to understand philosophy as a tool for thinking; thinking and making are separate, yet inform each other.

I think my biggest turning point in this approach was reading Clodagh Emoe's 'Performing Philosophy in a philosophical way'. What I got from it was that you create frameworks around artworks that give you ways in to think about the thinking that enabled the making to take place.

Another thing that has massively influenced me is Jez Riley French's article on Process... <https://issuu.com/ropis/docs/reflections_on_process3/0>. He basically says that we need to stop tagging on to a strand of theory and relying in theory in general. His main ethos is to 'get out there' and learn from practical experience.

I've been conscious this year of getting caught up too much in research, so I've made more of an attempt to go to galleries, rather than googling artists online. Also there's that trap of researching too much and realising there's a lot of 'different versions of the same art' which then stops me from making and sends me on a downwards spiral because there always seems so much of the same... I still question originality, I don't think it's impossible, but I do think it's very very very rare. Really, this is the term where I've done the least theoretical research, but perhaps I've been the most productive and progressive in my practice....

idea

thing at the end

Diagram of practice

I don't often return to the original idea. It always stays there underlying everything I guess, but I'm ok with it altering or changing slightly as the project progresses. The end outcome is usually different to the initial idea (but still has a link). I never think my first ideas are the best ideas.

Sound recording and listening around campus with Andy 1/3/17

fountain has a lovely sound - intentional sound within a space of many unintentional sounds
materiality of it adds to the echo
hyperaware
footsteps change; gravel, squelchy mud, brittle branches
sorry I took us through the thorns when the path was only two meters away
prickles and spikes through my jeans
wet mud covering my trainers
too warm for a raincoat today
why are sounds interesting?
problem with subjectivity: we’ll enjoy sitting and listening in a space to some sounds, the experience is relaxing, that’s it, it’s the experience that’s interesting - but then how do you relay that to an audience? - others might not find that interesting - so maybe it’s the editing that makes the sounds interesting, hmmmmm….
so… “do you think about the potential of a sound and the possibilities for it when it has been edited, or do you just enjoy the raw-ness of the original sound?” - A: “just gather anything and everything”, Me: “bit of both, maybe… can’t decide too much early on”
aw my batteries died (problems)
such a highly personal aspect of sensory experience; need that space for interpretation that’s not all about our experience of something - find that middle ground, the ‘hole’/‘space’ where a viewer can also learn/take something/enjoy the relayed experience too
at the end of the day, always gonna be subjective because an artist makes decisions and puts them in their work, just how you frame them and how much room you leave for interpretation
quickly, have to get back for work

A chat with Joel

I need an audience to make my work, work

Joel told me about a talk that Kate Davies gave at Grizedale Arts and I can't find it anywhere on the internet!!! He said that she was talking about her practice and used the analogy of the head, the heart and a hole to describe her work. The head was referring to the theory and thinking behind it all, I think the heart was the making and the interesting bit for me was the hole, which is the gap she leaves free for the audience to interpret, also for the artwork to come together. Basically, all 3 aspects rely on each other equally.

Joel helped me determine that I need an audience to piece my whole thing together, they are kind of the final jigsaw puzzle piece that completes the artwork as a whole.

Gallery Visit, Tate Liverpool: CÉCILE B. EVANS, 'Sprung a Leak'

...and reflection on current state of drawing alongside the sounds

Another thought on aesthetics; technology; and I've changed my mind

Last month I went to this exhibition, it's become quite relevant for my developments in my work now. I've never seen a room full of so much technology, and I very very briefly learnt how raspberry Pi works and there must have been about 12 around the whole room! Got to be honest, I really couldn't follow the narrative that was happening in the play between the two robots; something about an existential crisis and humanising technology? But I think that one of the robots broke so that obviously didn't help. It was interesting though to get a sense of human emotion and feelings through a very robotic and lifeless voice... and object. I was more interested though in the way that the sound filled the room and the aesthetic of the space. The sounds (that were not the robot's voices) created a dynamic flow through the space and seemed to lay on top of all the complicated technology. It didn't quite cut through the busy-ness of the space, but sort of placed itself on top of it all like a blanket. This also meant that it seemed like the sounds floated around the room, kind of connecting everything - subtly.

So yep, first thing: aesthetics of the use of sound.

Second thing was the visual aesthetic of the space. It looked busy and neatly-messy with electric cables and screens hovering here and there throughout the space. It got me thinking about the aesthetic choices I'm making in my own work at the moment. I'm currently trying to toss up between two possible ideas in the installation space; make the large scale drawings to go with each space for a speaker, or use a book as a map, so subtly injecting the drawings into the space. The reason I'm thinking about this is because originally I thought the large scale drawings would be good for impact in the space, there is something quite amazing about a a work when it's just bumped up in scale. However, the large drawings were going to hide the speakers... and here is where the problem arises. I'm working with sound (tech), presenting the sounds through a complicated speaker set up (tech), recording (tech) and editing (tech), yet the drawings would just come in and take precedence and hide all the efforts which have been tech based all term... it seems a bit wrong. Also, quite simply, it's obvious the sounds are coming from speakers so why hide them!!? Also going back to the points I mentioned somewhere before in this blog about hardware being just as relevant within the art. It would seem quite fake in a way I think to go down that route of large scale drawings. More than anything though, the sound in the installation currently as the main source for immersive impact I think.

1/3

The funniest (kind of) oxymoron that I think sums up engagement in art:

laying down/relaxing often allows for a more active engagement

I've seen a lot of art spaces recently where laying down or just being in the space is quite contrary to normal ways of moving about (or not) within a space. That fact about the average time spent in front of an artwork being around 6 seconds is something that stresses me out, I can't stand that thought of an artist putting so much time to a work for it only to be passed by so quickly. Fair enough you're never going to capture everybody's attention, so naturally, people will pass on by, but it makes me think, as the creators of artworks, we have control over these factors, if it's something I don't like, I have to think of ways to alter that engagement.

There are two artworks that I have been to recently that slow people down to allow time to engage; 1. Tyrrau Mawr (2016) by Bedwyr Williams at Artes Mundi, Cardiff and 2. Joachim Koester at Camden Arts Centre.

Bedwyr Williams' work seems to have this strong narrative of fact/fiction blur. I feel like it's instantly noticeable with the obviously fake looking city, but through encouraging me to sit down in the space and listen to the narrative, you get a more in depth insight into stories/histories of the town. You'd expect people to live there, he talks about specific people like the fisherman, the baker, the office workers, but the visual shows the opposite; no people, no movement, the only movement comes from the feint ripples on the lake surface and the reflections of light of the buildings that change only because of the time of the day. Building lights come on and off at certain points, but no people move or even appear. It was quite an unsettling, but weirdly lovely experience.

Another interesting use of the space was the use of shared or private audio. You could either listen to it out loud in the room or wear headphones. It was such a simple touch, but worked so well in altering your expeience of the room, and also giving a little bit of agency to the viewer/listener.

The layout of the room, curated so so well. You kind of knew the flow of the room so naturally because of the layout of the walls and bed-like structures. I like how it wasn't forceful, but felt guided at the same time. It made me think that the way you move in a space really alters your engagement and perception of the space.

Why is this important?

- that space in a gallery or wherever it may be is a bubble/contrast to busy outside life, this is important to take a moment sometimes, and what nicer way to do that than through art? -

Relation to own work: As sound is durational, it's a good tool to use to subtly control people in a space, and their engagement. Although, I know it doesn't always go to plan.

Are there rules or certain parameters for engaged durational works?

inviting/don't force/give choice? differences between gallery space and engagement artworks outside spaces

I think something else that is interesting about works like these is the intentionally slowing you down and the perception of time you feel when immersed.

Own work: Playing with perception: why?

I don't think that it's so much to do with an interest in the science behind perception at this stage, but more that I think by 'teasing' the senses, you're kind of encouraged to heighten and bring a more careful awareness to that sense.

Acousmatic listening is the fancy name for what I'm mainly doing, which is altering the recognisability of a sound's source. Bringing the focus to listening over hearing, I think by playing with this idea, it encourages you to listen more actively to try and solve the puzzle. I've used software to edit the sounds and have ordered them in such a way that the true sound gradually emerges, so that you get that light bulb ping moment of familiarity.

Test 2: drawings and sound on larger scale

UNA exhibition at the Storey, Lancaster

'Hear Me Out'

When I was still toying with the idea of using large drawing/sculptures in the space, I had this one box made ready in time for the exhibition, so thought it might be nice to test it on a big audience. I think sometimes names can be funny, and also act as an important 'way in' to help the audience think about the meaning embedded in the work.

Drawing on all the things already mentioned about duration/teasing senses I think that the title sums up all these ideas quite neatly. Beth helped me think it up while we made cups of tea in her kitchen. Tea aids productive thinking :)

In the exhibition, something quite unexpected happened because of a bit of a mistake on my part. I forgot to turn the volume right up, so you could hear sound here and there so I guess that worked unintentionally in the sense that it would catch people off guard. But people started sitting around the box to look at the drawings and listen a bit more intently... result?!

I turned the volume back up when I realised.

But it meant that I had a slightly different piece to run alongside the main work I'm working on in the installation space to illustrate my ideas on listening.

Originally, I was going to fill A23 with structures like this, varied in shape and size, but from observing people's engagement with it in the exhibition, it seems that the visual overpowers the audio in general, so I don't want that to be the first thing that hits you when you walk into the space. I know I've had tendencies in the past to overcomplicate my work and have too much going on, so I'm sticking with the book idea because of this reason.

Current statement

My practice revolves around a central theme of altering our habitual engagement with the senses; collecting familiar, but overlooked sounds that make up the soundtrack to our everyday lives and situating them in a new context. My interest lies in challenging our engagement with less familiar senses, questioning how this shapes our experience of everyday encounters.

Final Space

Collecting sounds:

- in my room

-bringing objects into recording studio

- on long bike rides

- on my way into uni

- weekend walks

- campus

SOUNDBANK

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/z0orxe1nr1iggvy/AAD2y3x2FkShHTnMbPM8G3I7a?dl=0

channel 1

channel 2

channel 3

channel 4

channel 5

channel 6

mono section

stereo section

Room 2

Room 1

Headphone section

Curation of the two spaces and the relation to playing with perception

The installation begins in the small corridor with residue sounds, so you start backwards with the make up of a sound.

The two rooms aim to play with perception in two ways. The first room tests you in whether you can distinguish digital from real resonances, and the main room tests you in whether you can detect the object from where the sound originates.

digital vs. real sound residues

everyday real objects

Sound map Books

Function and design

The books work as a map for the space. The forms are created through a process I described earlier in the blog about thinking of sounds in terms of sculpture. Each double spread page relates to the layout of the room and the drawings are positioned in relation to the position of the speakers in the room; channel 1-6.

This is the alternative to having arge drawings in the spacee. I actually think they work better anyway because it makes the audience more active, by having to physically hold the book and turn pages etc.