Synopsis and Bios

This installation incorporates and intertwines some of André’s best visual and sound explorations transposed to performative and installation contexts. Considering the site-specificity of the space, it makes use of a modular synthesiser system to generate landscapes of ever changing musical patterns, leading to a contemplative state.

André will perform at the exhibition opening, and then leave the system working in an autonomous way.

Biography

André Gonçalves works across the fields of visual arts, music, video, installation and performance. His works have been presented in several galleries and festivals such as Nam June Paik Art Center, Seoul; FILE, Sao Paulo; Experimental Intermedia Foundation, New York; ICA, London; Steim, Amsterdam; Museu Vostell Malpartida, Cáceres; Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon. His music work, solo or in collective projects, include more than 15 editions in several recording labels Over the past few years he has also built a solid reputation developing widely praised modular hardware synthesizers under ADDAC System brand, which are now being used by many musicians throughout the whole world.

The work constantly trawls the websites of selected news organisations and downloads al the visual imagery it comes across. These images are then sampled to provide a large number of fragments, each reflecting the preoccupations and priorities of the news gathering organizations. The small size of these samples prevents them from functioning iconically; each is a fragment, which will usually suggest a larger context, but which will almost never present its references fully formed. The fragments are all catalogued; stored, together with their average colour value in a constantly evolving database. This is the palette from which the work constructs its portraits. 

To engage with the work, the visitor needs to invest some time. As they examine the piece, their portrait will gradually emerge from the background presentation of several hundred tiny fragments, which are in a continuous state of flux.

Biography

Ian Willcock is a digital artist, researcher and lecturer in Interactive Media and Live Performance. His musical, multimedia and digital-performance pieces have been presented internationally and he has received many prizes and scholarships. Several of his pieces are published and his work is available on commercial recordings. He has collaborated on a number of large-scale digital performance and mixed-media installation projects and in 2012 completed his doctorate in Multimedia and Live Performance at De Montfort University. Ian Willcock is a Principal Lecturer in Interactive Media at the University of Hertfordshire, where he leads the PG Media programme.

ALESSIO CHIERICO

Trāṭaka is a Sanskrit term which means “to look” or “to gaze”. It refers to a meditation technique, in which one focuses attention upon a small object, usually a flame. This technique is used to stimulate a certain point of the brain, the ājňā chakra. In the Hindu tradition, this chakra is one of the six main centers of vital energy. It is considered the eye of intuition and intellect. 

In this installation, the visitor is invited to wear a brain-computer interface, and concentrate his attention on a candle flame. The level of attention controls an air flow under the flame; the highest level of attention makes the flow become strong enough to extinguish the flame.

This work creates a conceptual loop: brain activity related to attention leads to a meditation technique, which in turn is meant to stimulate the chakra responsible for brain activity.

Biography

Alessio Chierico is currently a MA candidate of the Interface Culture department in the Art and Design University Linz. Former student of the art academies Urbino, Carrara and NABA in Milan, in courses related to the new technologies of art production, design and media theory. In the last eight years he had about fifty exhibitions, including: ArteLaguna prize in Venice (2014), Victoria Art gallery in Bucharest (2014), Speculum Artium festival in Slovenia (2013), Ars Electronica festival (2014, 2013), Museo di Scienze Naturali of Torino (2013), MLAC of Rome (2012), MAGA in Gallarate (2011), Fabbrica del Vapore in Milan (2008).

RODRIGO CARVALHO, YAGO DE QUAY, SHEN JUN

The Interpreter 

This work explores dance movement sequences, visualizing and sonifying motion data, creating new perceptions, interpretations and outcomes. It generates glitch ambient sounds and visual flow patterns from pre-recorded dance motion data and a touchscreen interface made available to visitors. The goal is to deconstruct the dancer’s movements and encourage participants to experiment with different kinds of audio-visual mappings. Visitors are invited to explore and interact with the installation through a console with various parameters that affect the visual and sonic interpretation of pre-recorded movement sequences. 

Biographies

Rodrigo Carvalho is designer & new media artist from Porto/Portugal. Graduated in Design (Aveiro-PT.2005) and with a Master Degree in Digital Arts (Barcelona – ES.2009). He is nowadays a PhD student in Digital Media in the University of Porto/FCT under the UT Austin/Portugal Program. His work is focused in the relations and the synergies between sound, movement and image in audiovisual real time systems and environments.

Yago de Quay is a musician who performs with sensors on his body. His work with sensors and electronic music started in 2010 with a grant by the European Union to implement interactive music sensors in night clubs. In 2013 he received the Audience Favorite Prize at West By West Campus Film Festival for the film NOLA and the Critics Table Awards nomination for the Best Video Design for the multimedia performance 3D[Embodied]. This year Yago was commissioned a live performance piece that uses brain waves and a 3D sensor for the Ammerman Center for Arts and Technology at Connecticut College.

Shen Jun, Jiang Yin, China. He attended Wuxi Culture and Arts School to learn dance in 1995, danced in Wuxi's Song and Dance Troupe in 1998. Admitted into Beijing Capital Normal University as a dance major in 2001, graduated with a Bachelors of Fine Arts degree and became a modern dancer and choreography for Beijing Dance/LDTX Company in 2005, going on tour with the company worldwide. In September 2009, he left Beijing Dance/LDTX to become an independent dancer and choreographer. In 2013, he earned the full scholarship and fellowship of UT Austin and became a Graduate student of MFA in Dance.