On NOV 6th and NOV 7th of 2010 CFRC 101.9FM held a special multi-channel ‘screening’ of audio pieces in the dark. This event was called Hear in The Dark. This Radia episode provides for your listening enjoyment a selection from the pieces that were ‘screened’ on those nights. Featuring work by: Louise Bark, Kristiana Clemens, Neven Lochhead, Decomposing Pianos and Irina Skvortsova. Hear in the Dark was made possible with the generous support of the City of Kingston and the Kingston Arts Council.
Show 294: sound, light, locality : the frederick street sound and light exploration society, by Sally Ann McIntyre
intermingling audio and interviews recorded at the experimental music festival ‘Fredstock’, which gathered together together 62 performers over 4 days (Wednesday 27th – Saturday 30th October 2010) in Wellington, New Zealand, this documentary amplifies some of the voices from the diverse and cross-pollinating experimental music culture associated with the central Wellington artist-run performance space ‘the Frederick Street Sound and Light Exploration Society’ (affectionately known to its community as ‘Freds’), while asking wider questions around the history and practice of experimental music in Wellington, the particularity of localised micro-scenes, the role of key figures driving the culture, and, implicitly, how underground artistic communities can build strategies for their ongoing survival.
deliberately emphasising the tentative, exploratory nature of the current discourse surrounding NZ audio culture, the documentary formally structures itself as a listening experience with loose links to Glenn Gould’s documentary methods, although it is also akin to a critically minded yet casual conversation that might be had at a night out watching a gig. It can be listened to as a companion-piece of sorts to the earlier R1 documentary contribution to the network ‘Lines of Flight : a Sonic Community’ (s20 n231), and forms part of an ongoing research interest in charting the sonic territories of New Zealand experimental audio culture.
interviews with : Jeremy Coubrough, Daniel Beban, Torben Tilly, Bek Coogan, Chris Prosser, Mark Williams, Noel Meek, Campbell Walker, Erika Grant, Sean Kelly, Thomas Lambert.
music / audio by : Full Fucking Moon, Peter Wright, Ming, The Doubles, Claypipe, Seth Frightening, Chris Prosser/Erika Grant/Art Sushi, and Douglas Lilburn covers band the Urinal Bulldogs.
interviewer, editor, producer : sally ann mcintyre
produced for the Radia network 2010, a contribution from member station Radio One 91FM, Dunedin.
Show 293: Zen & Napalm by Ghazi Barakat
PHAROAH CHROMIUM (mutant psych / kozmic blues / concrete jungle)
New project from Ghazi Barakat (Boy from Brazil, Assassinations, Golden Showers). Three sampling devices, too many effects and a little make-up. Machines as life support devices. A cardiopulmonary bypass playing the soundtrack of your life. When is the time right to turn it off?
Special: Curated by RADIA: Out of Breath by Jean-Philippe Renoult
Jean-Philippe Renoult is a sound artist, radio producer, lecturer and independent curator based in Paris. His piece for the Curated by Radia series refers to specific events in French politics which occurred in summer 2010, when the radio artists resided at Gasometer Oberhausen. His piece “Out of Breath” links documents of these events with the spectacular acoustic qualities of the industrial space.
“For the Radia art camp at the Gasometer in Oberhausen I was literally ‘Out of Breath’ for two main reasons, firstly because I climbed the 800 steps of the outdoor staircase of the Gasometer as the thermometer hit 36° C, which is no mean feat for a smoker, and secondly because I feel worn out by the state of French politics, in particular the L’Oreal family feud which has led to a series of investigations concerning political donations, tax evasion and money laundering.
I decided to voice this fatigue by reading the offensive comments by readers on the French investigative journalism website Mediapart’s decision to publish extracts from secret recordings between L’Oreal heiress and Europe’s richest woman Liliane Bettencourt, and her financial advisor Patrick De Maistre. In these recordings Maistre clearly advises Liliane on how to corrupt government members and the best way to avoid a hefty tax bill.
Using the incredible resonance of the Gasometer, where every sigh, click, hum and cough are amplified to enormous proportions ‘Out of Breath’ is a radio creation that addresses the idea of suffocation through in situ readings and location recordings intercut with extracts from the actual tapes.”
Show 292: alternative news in an alternative (( sound art )) format
production:
amie watson
adelaide simon
liz pieries
neil griffith
courtney kirkby
maria mavrig
esther b
date: october 2010
station: radio ckut (montreal, canada)
length: 29 min. (and 38 secs.)
Special: Curated by RADIA: 100 Words Per Metre by Sarah Washington
The invitation by Kunstradio to produce a series of shows raised the question of a common denominator that could tie the pieces together.
It was suggested to hold a production meeting for Radia artists to share the initial impulse for the creation of the shows. As a location for this meeting Radia managed to secure one of the most imposing exhibition spaces in Europe, the Gasometer in Oberhausen. With a height of 117 meters and a diameter of 68 meters it boasts one of the most extreme acoustics of any public building, with ample of natural reverb and delay.
Eight artists from five countries spent two nights and one day in and around the giant steel cylinder and began to incubate their ideas which were subsequently finalized in their own studios. Radio art is, in this instance, a function of space.
The second part in the series is a work produced by Sarah Washington and entitled “100 Words Per Metre”:
“A dialogue occurs that empties itself into the booming darkness; freely associated text that speaks about the function of words, how they delight and frustrate. Sentences cascade down out of sight whilst others rise up and strive to reach them – in-between lies the mysterious space of their meeting. Two artists interrogate the integrity of words by propelling their voices from top to bottom and bottom to top of the vast metal cylinder of the Gasometer Oberhausen. Conversation ebbs and flows where sense overlaps, where voices merge into the overwhelming reverberation of the building or are lost to storm water streaming down through the towering gloom. Interwoven with this expansive and elongated dialogue is an opposition: the intimate personal musings of artists on the subject of Radio Art. What is Radio Art? Where can you find it? And in the end, can words help us at all?”
Producer: Sarah Washington
Text and voices: Sarah Washington und Dinah Bird
Recordings:Dinah Bird und Knut Aufermann
Additional voices: International Radio Artists
Languages: English and German
Show 291: Heimkehr by Rinus van Alebeek and Alessandra Eramo
coming home from nowhere to somewhere – or was it the other way round? let´s see. or maybe better: let´s listen…
rinus van alebeek is a sound artist, writer and performer from holland, living and working in berlin and elsewhere. find out more about rinus van alebeek and his work at zeromoon.com/rinus
alessandra eramo a.k.a ezramo is a sound artist, composer and performer from taranto, italy. she’s currently living and working in berlin, germany. further information about alessandra eramo a.k.a ezramo and her work can be found at www.ezramo.com
special thanks to corsica s. for the beautiful radiator sounds!
Special: Curated by RADIA: Don’t measure me by Paulo Raposo
“My approach to the Gasometer in Oberhausen consisted in exploring both its outside and inside. Quite impressed, and almost in vertigo, by its incredible height (120m) and its massive metal structure, I mirrored and juxtaposed the metal structures and connections which were being heavily provoked through a passing tornado (believe it) with its immensely reverberating “inside” and its everlasting wave of sound. The strong wind outside and the powerful hum inside provided an intriguing affinity to the interplay of both parts. And both invisible, ungraspable, continuously haunting and mesmerizing.
In this sense, I want to suggest the power and density of the huge organic building which, that ceasing its utilitarian purpose, stands nevertheless open to imagination and awareness.”
Recordings: Paulo Raposo
Additional voices and recordings: Other Radio Art camps artists.
Language: English
Production: Paulo Raposo for Kunstradio
Show 290: artist as a wolf by Ralf Wendt
Go with your small radio during the radia show into an exhibition and spread the text without taking contact to the other visitors. Let your radio speak for you. And Christine Oppenheim sing for you.
Ralf Wendt lives and works in Halle/S.- E.Germany. His works surround situations of ill communications – He is trying to deconstruct codes and methods of different languages, spoken, written language and gestures. Wendt is working in the field of performance in public space, istallation in galleries and public, poetry and soundart in radio and gallery. Soundworks for different worldwide radiostations as Kunstradio Vienna, Radia.FM and others. Performances happened in Europe, Asia – such as Vietnam, Phillipines and in the USA. He is an active member of performance-group The Wolf in The Winter.
Special: Curated by RADIA: Radio art is what I think it is by Knut Aufermann
The invitation by Kunstradio to produce a series of shows raised the question of a common denominator that could tie the pieces together. It was suggested to hold a production meeting for Radia artists to share the initial impulse for the creation of the shows.
As a location for this meeting Radia managed to secure one of the most imposing exhibition spaces in Europe, the Gasometer in Oberhausen. With a height of 117 meters and a diameter of 68 meters it boasts one of the most extreme acoustics of any public building, with ample of natural reverb and delay. Eight artists from five countries spent two nights and one day in and around the giant steel cylinder and began to incubate their ideas which were subsequently finalized in their own studios. Radio art is, in this instance, a function of space.
Opening the Curated by series is a radiophonic analysis of the production of radio art by Knut Aufermann of Resonance104.4fm, “Radio art is what I think it is”:
„How is radio art produced? In this case on the computer, where the recordings from the Gasometer Oberhausen are arranged. Verena Kuni’s sonorous voice is set in contrast to the feedback sounds produced in the Gasometer’s giant metal cylinder. My idea is to incorporate thoughts and decisions that went into the piece, rather than presenting it as a finished entity.
An inspiration for this self-experiment was a radio performance by the avantgarde musician Keith Rowe for Resonance104.4fm in 2002. Whilst performing, he all of a sudden demanded a microphone and started explaining to the listeners why and how he was modulating the sounds on his electric guitar in front of him.
The title of the piece refers to Ed Baxter’s ironic statement ‚Radio art is what I say it is‘.“