The Door Installation

The Door Installation

Galleries tend to be large cavernous spaces that can blend fairly seamlessly into one another.  There may be doorways, passages, avenues…but the architecture of many gallery spaces seem to be designed for a visitor to seamlessly move from one environment into another, often gradually, often unconsciously. Referentially discrete, but essentially open.

We have talked at length about the way in which a visitor to APHASIA might experience the first few seconds of our piece. We concluded that an action - a simple action - would delineate the environment outside of APHASIA from the world within.

That action is the opening of a door, passing through the opening, and the closing of the door. A conscious decision to enter, to leave the known outside. For us, it imbues the first moments of APHASIA with a sense of demarcation from the external world, and the entry into a world of imprecise meanings and permeable memory. 

The door is red. A barrier. A full stop…what lies beyond the closed door? An alluring promise as some red is wont to suggest? A point of entry into prosperity and joy? Warmth? Attraction?

This is the first step - the negotiation of a barrier, and the acceptance of our invitation to enter.

Working with the inside/outside space of APHASIA, we have developed a quiet sound installation that exists outside of the space.  This external sound environment is in contrast to the sound within APHASIA. 

The chorale that plays outside was recorded over a two day period during our residency at Bundanon, and is built around Darragh singing céad míle fáilte - an Irish hymn that begins with the famous and much loved Irish greeting meaning 'a hundred thousand welcomes'. It is a song of solidarity that transcends its religious overtones, residing firmly in the cultural consciousness of Irish self-determination.

Céad míle fáilte romhat, a Íosa, a Íosa
Céad míle fáilte romhat, a Íosa
Céad míle fáilte romhat a Shlánaítheoir
Céad míle míle fáilte romhat,a Íosa, a Íosa

Here is but one version of the song sung by Maureen Hegarty: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMpvaWgeHYw 

Our treatment of the song renders it almost unrecognisable.  Almost…

Whilst individual words are rendered practically indecipherable, it retains the colour and tonal flexibility of the vowel sounds whilst accentuating the sibilance. We also think it retains the spirit of welcome that is core to the original hymn. When the door is closed, our arrangement of céad míle fáilte can no longer be heard.  It exists only in the memory as the viewer is immersed in a new sound world and the eye is drawn towards the looming tape mass - all 43 kilometres of it. 

Here is an excerpt of our version:

Into a new domain, where the chorale of greeting exists only in the mind, and is immediately re-interpreted with new sounds of whispers, declamations, sines and percussion. As the door is opened and closed in the same conscious action, there is a transition from one world into another.

Into APHASIA.

D&D

Australian Centre for Photography

APHASIA at the Australian Centre for Photography

We are delighted to be able to share the great news that APHASIA will have its international premiere at the Australian Centre for Photography in Sydney!


APHASIA will open on December 1 2012 and run through until mid-February 2013.


The Australian Centre for Photography (ACP) is a national centre of excellence in the exhibition, education and publication of photography. With four decades of experience, it is the longest running contemporary art space in Australia. With its fantastically versatile exhibition space, APHASIA finds a resonant place to call its first home.


We have been working alongside the ACP team in exploring the opportunities for tuning APHASIA to the dynamism of the space. It is a great, positive working relationship - collegial and creative.


We hope we will see you at the opening at ACP, and during APHASIA's run at ACP.


Thanks to our grand new friends at ACP with whom we've been working: Kon, Tony, Michael and Belinda in particular.  We are looking forward to meeting and working alongside the rest of the team as we move towards December!


If you are not familiar with the ACP, have look at their website by visiting www.acp.org.au .


D&D

The Elements of APHASIA

The elements of APHASIA

APHASIA is an immersive, convergent installation that has within it discrete elements that combine to create at atmosphere of missed communication, contested meaning, changing context and imprecise memory.


The elements within are:

• Entry installation - a red door through which you must pass through to enter APHASIA
• Tape and fog sculptural installation - masses of audio reel-to-reel tape suspended from the ceiling and fog hugging the floor create a sense of disembodiment and disconnection from the immediate physical surroundings.  In moving within and through the tape installation, the spectator negotiates a sensory dissociation with the field of vision restricted (with tape gently falling across the face) and with sound emanating from above.  The fog at floor level further reinforces this disembodiment, rendering the physical 'grounding' unseeable
• Quadraphonic sound installation - a quiet, understated sound composition based around the texts of letters to Darragh, and her own dreams spatialised within the gallery
• Infrasonic installation - an inaudible sonic installation that has an involuntary impact on the physiology of the spectator
• Video projection installation - a return to the red door presented in an unfamiliar and unknowing context...

Read and experienced together, these elements combine to create a new world that is at first experienced linearly, then simultaneously. It draws upon sight, sound, touch - and it explores the minutiae of personal (mis)understanding amplified to a universal experience.

Each element will have its own entry in this blog as they move independently, but interconnectedly, from conceptualisation through to resolution and production...

D&D