Specialising and Exhibiting – Theo Power

Krzysztof Penderecki was an avant-garde Polish composer known in particular for his works Polymorphia, Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima, and Symphony N0.3. Penderecki was famous for his use of microtonal clusters, glissandi (silding), and quarter note clusters. His work has appeared in many films like The Exorcist, The Shining (where 6 of Penderecki’s pieces are used),

This week is the first week back after the Christmas break and we are all reunited in class to plan, conceptualise, and talk about the gallery.

This week I’ve planned two practise sessions to experiment with the sound for this project and to create a ground floor to work off for the coming weeks. I have rented out a Zoom H5 dictaphone to record sounds to use in the score. I plan to record industrial/metallic sounds like

When rescoring someone else’s work it is very important to understand the context of the work, what time period the work was made in, where the film was made, and the artist’s intention. If all these go ignored, it feels disrespectful to create your own art on top of someone else’s, because you do not understand the whole context of the movie.

10/65 Self Mutilation has no score, much like all the other films created by the Vienesse Actionists. I personally prefer working with films with no score, as I cannot be inspired in any way other than the visuals. It gives me more free range to compose what I think this would sound like if it had sound. When conceptualising how my composition would sound I made a playlist of music that I played alongside the film. You can see this playlist here. I was inspired by a mixture of drone, noise, and ambient. I did not want this composition to rely heavily on drones, as I used lots of drones in my previous composition. I structured the composition into 3 parts. The first part being more noise heavy to emphasise the pain and distrubing nature of the opening of this film. The second part being more drone based to change up from the heavy noise use in the first half, while still emphasising the anger and torment. The third part will be more ambient to work with the melancholy ending of the film.

There are some great examples of rescores of already existing movies. One of them would be Nicolas Jaar’s rescore of the Soviet-Armenian film ‘The Colour Of Pomegranates’. The Colour Of Pomegranates (released in 1969) is a surreal art film directed by Sergei Parajanov and is about the real-life Armenian ashug (a singing poet/bard) called Sayat-Nova. The film walks us through Sayat-Novas’s life in a very experimental way, instead of using a traditional film where it is primarily dialogue and structured in a typical way. Instead, the film is told in a much more poetic way by mainly using visual storytelling with minimal dialogue. The original sound for the film relies more on sound design than traditional music, but music is featured throughout the film at points. The way Nicolas took this film and reworked the sound to an even more experimental but not overbearing soundtrack was really inspirational to me. Jaar mixes sound design and these mixtures of ambient music and glitchy avant-garde beats that Jaar is known for.

In the first lecture of the year, we discussed more in-depth the logistics of the gallery. We created a document over the break where we could all put in our ideas for the exhibition. During the lecture another document was made were roles/groups were decided. James and I voluenteerd to lead/look over the sound for screen element of the exhibition. We are not dictators or deciding every detail with no input from anyone else, we are here to help guide, plan and work with everyone else in this group. The goal for this group is to have a supportive network of people who are all passionate about sound and screen, who are here to help and inspire one another.

I decided to do some research on showing film in an exhibition setting. Last year at the gallery there was a TV for people with sound for screen work. This is fine and does the job well, but I think there is a way we can make it more immersive/interesting when it comes to using the space. This is something I will discuss with everyone so we can gather ideas to try and utilise the space the best we can. Personally I like the idea of a dark room with a minimal setup using either a TV screen or a projector. I think the idea of a minimalist setup works best as it makes you focus on the work being shown more carefully. If the room is overcomplicated by objects, bright lights, sound from other exhibitions. It can take away from the xperiance of watching a film, which for me should be quiet and immersive. I will discuss this with everyone and we can all gather ideas on what we want the space to be like.

www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Bite The Bolster. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25yoKdlopRA&list=PLbFiDQOZHuEQZjnNVd9Cy_Sw4J3nnA_nR

www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Yellow Swans – Limited Space. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DF3KSYch8dE&list=PLbFiDQOZHuEQZjnNVd9Cy_Sw4J3nnA_nR&index=2

www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Angus Maclise – Trance 2. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYKgCR55u88&list=PLbFiDQOZHuEQZjnNVd9Cy_Sw4J3nnA_nR&index=3

www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Rakka. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=55wSb9RbrfY&list=PLbFiDQOZHuEQZjnNVd9Cy_Sw4J3nnA_nR&index=4

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I do have to give a warning that most of these Action Films contain graphic nudity and violence. These films have a very uncomfortable tone and can make you feel quite unwell. In particular the film 16/67 20. SEPTEMBER, which Id recommend avoiding if you are grossed out by bodily fluids and human excrement.

The Viennese Actionism movement had a strong connection to experimental cinema during its exsistence, In particular with director Kurt Kren who started making action films in 1964. Kren worked alongside Günter Brus and Otto Mühl mostly in the making of these experimental shorts.

I have watched 27 (out of 48) of Kurt Krens movies as of now, which is 56% of his entire discography. This has given me a good understanding of the foundations of Action movies, and Krens other work during/after the Viennese Actionism period. All of these films have no sound whatsoever. Most of these works were shot using 16mm film, which typically does not use sound.

Below are Krens Action Films that I have viewed, these films were created alongside Viennese Actionists Günter Brus and Otto Mühl primarily.

6/64 MAMA UND PAPA 3:57 MIN, – 6/64 Mum And Dad

7/64 LEDA MIT DEM SCHWAN 2:56 MIN,  – 7/64 Leda and the Swan

8/64 ANA 2:40 MIN, 

9/64 O TANNENBAUM 2:56 MIN, – 9/60 O Christmas Tree

10/65 SELBSTVERSTÜMMELUNG 5:19 MIN,  – 10/65 Self Mutilation

10B/65 SILBER ­ AKTION BRUS 2:34 MIN, – 10B/65 Silver Action Brus

10C/65 BRUS WÜNSCHT EUCH SEINE WEIHNACHTEN 2:56 MIN, – 10C/65 Brus wishes his Christmas on you.

12/66 COSINUS ALPHA 9:16 MIN, 

13/67 SINUS BETA 5:58 MIN, 

16/67 20. SEPTEMBER 6:53 MIN

Brus and Mühl‘s collaboration with Kren has led to one of the most popular ways to experience the Viennese Actionism movement, as they have all been preserved and can be found online relatively easily. Most of these films contain the trademark nudity, violence, and chaos that the movement was known for, this is mixed with Krens signature choppy, disorientating and fast editing that makes these films very polarising and disorientating to watch.

Below are Krens Structural Films that I have viewed

1/57 Versuch Mit Synthetischem Ton (Test) (1/57 Experiment With Synthetic Sound (Test)) 1:23 min ,

2/60 48 Köpfe Aus Dem Szondi-Test (2/60 48 Heads From The Szondi-Test) 4:19 min,

3/60 Bäume Im Herbst (3/60 Trees In Autumn) 5:03 min,

4/61 Mauern Pos.-Neg. Und Weg (4/61 Walls Pos.-Neg. And Way) 6:09 min,

5/62 Fenstergucker, Abfall Etc. (5/62 People Looking Out Of The Window, Trash Etc.) 4:48 min,

11/65 Bild Helga Philipp (11/65 Helga Philipp Painting) 2:29 min,

15/67 Tv 4:08 min,

17/68 Grün-Rot (17/68 Green-Red) 2:56 min,

20/68 Schatzi 2:29 min,

28/73 Zeitaufnahme(N) (28/73 Time Exposure(S)) 2:56 min,

31/75 Asyl (31/75 Asylum) 8:26 min,

32/76 An W+B (32/76 To W+B) 7:42 min,

36/78 Rischart 3:02 min,

37/78 Tree Again 3:46 min,

38/79 Sentimental Punk 4:30 min,

49/95 Tausendjahrekino (49/95 Thousandyearsofcinema) 2:40 min

Viennese Actionism was an avant-garde art movement that took place during the 1960s-1970s in Vienna, Austria. The movement was mainly comprised of the artists Günter Brus, Otto Mühl, Hermann Nitsch, and Rudolf Schwarzkogler. During this time these artists would also collaborate with with Anni Brus, Heinz Cibulka and Valerie Export. Brus, Mühl, Nitsch, Schwarzkogler and others would be referred to as Actionists and their work would be referred to as actions. Contrary to being called artists and having work referred to as artwork, it feels like a break away from technical terms and to go against the norm.

Viennese Actionism is an intentionally transgressive art form, including graphic nudity, violence, and the tackling of taboos. throughout the movements short-lived life lots of shocking performances, films, and art pieces were created. Due to the often graphic and extreme nature of their live performances Brus, Mühl and Nitsch have all ended up spending small prison sentences ranging from 2 weeks to 6 months for violation of decency laws. Brus, Mühl, Nitsch and Schwarzkogler did these live performances to shock the Austrian public and government which was at the time

One of my ideas for the exhibition would be to create sound for a clip. I have experience doing this already this year with the Sound For Screen unit by rescoring David Lynch’s The Alphabet. I would like to go into film composing as a career choice after university, so this could be another way to experiment with sound for screen and push my skills. When thinking about composing for screen I am drawn to experimental cinema. Experimental cinema is great for composing opportunities as avant-garde films range in tone and genre which gives you lots of choices to compose for. For example, you have films like Enter The Void (Dir. Gaspar Noe) which is a heavily stylised, colourful, and intense film filled with techno and dark ambient music. You also have films like Satantango (Dir. Bella Tarr) which is a 7-hour film filled with bleak cinematography, Tarkovsky Esque cinematography, and a very minimal score. There are lots of opportunities when it comes to composing a film, it is important to figure out

Over the Christmas break, I decided to revisit the work of the Vienesse Actionist movement that took place throughout the 1960s-1970s. I will make a whole blog dedicated to the movement and what the movement was about. But throughout their time numerous experimental short films were created by these Vienesse Actionists that I found very inspiriting. The Actionists use the human body as the main centrepiece of their work, the way this is explored in these experimental shorts feels like a predecessor to the body horror subgenre that would start to come into place in the 1970s with directors like David Cronenberg.

For our element 2 of specialising and exhibiting, we have been proposed to create something for an sound installation gallery at Gallery 46 in Whitechapel. Last year me and Rysia Kaczmar performed at the gallery as Grawlix, an experimental duo creating sound from dj sets, noise, ambient, techno, and performance art. We performed at the private showcase last minute and with this I got to explore the Gallery and see what my peers have created. I was blown away by what I saw, it was a vast mixture of art with different concepts and medias. I saw installations made with a nagra tape machine, an octophonic ring, music for oscilloscopes, and some weird feedback loops created by using the washroom. Being exposed to all of this gave me an early start of thinking what I could be doing in a years time.

I never thought of myself as someone who would have work in an art installation, I was never the best at art during my time at school, but always wanted to do something with visual art, wether it was video, paintings, or sculpture. But with my mediocre grades and feedback, I put that to the wayside as I thought it would be something not worth pursuing because I was told I was not very good. I was trained as a drummer for brass bands, concert bands, and in my free time I would punk bands. So throughout my late secondary school/college years I was thinking of becoming a session musician, being hired as a drummer for anything. I went to college to study drums and you are trained to become someone in the ‘industry’ (a word I personally dislike). Being around industry type people made me realise I did not want to be in that world, it is very corrupt and anti creativity. I was creating ambient music with tape loops during my time there and it was always seen more as a spectacle because it was odd. After college I came to ual to study sound arts. While studying on this course I realised you an create exhibitions out of sound, which reignited my passion for art other than sound. I also realised you could use playback devices like tape machines and record players as a part of the installation. It felt like I was finally able to create visual art with something I am passionate about.

As of now (5/12/22) I am finding it hard to solidify one idea, luckily the Christmas break is around the corner, and I will have time to experiment with all these ideas and see which one I gravitate towards.

Something important when creating something to go to an art installation is size, considering their is 20 odd people in my class who are most likely all wanting to submit something, it is best to try and work together to utilise the space to its ability. Even is my piece does not get chosen it will be a valuable exercise for me regardless. These are my ideas

1. Microcassette and Cassette Loops