‘Mesh’ DIEM Electronic Media Project 2013

In October 2013, I was lucky enough to take part in the 5x5x15 Electronic Media Project at DIEM (Danish Institue of Electronic Music) at the Royal Academy of Music, Aarhus, Denmark. The project commissioned five visual artist’s to collaborate with five composers currently studying at DIEM. I worked with Sebastian Edin a Swedish composer on composing a new audio-visual piece.

Prior to my visit to Aarhus, I created a sculpture from paper clips, plaster and formica (see pictures). The form was initially sketched-out using pen and paper, the resulting image eventually began to resemble that of a human body. The final sculpture using a modular design of objects that were inserted and positioned symmetrically onto a paneled surface. During the experience of hand-crafting the sculpture I became aware of the material differences of the physical properties, this knowledge is later translated into the digital domain. Once completed, the sculpture was filmed, photographed and then digitally transformed into a screen-based version.

Symmetry became a reoccurring spatial aspect in the convergence of real and virtual media. The dynamic malleability of the audio-visual medium reveals perceptual differences between consonance and dissonance. Composing music in this way becomes a translation of seemingly different modalities into a mutually comprehensible form.

The senses translate each other without any need of interpreter, and are mutually comprehensible without the intervention of any idea.
Merleau-Ponty, (1994) Maurice Phenomenology of Perception, London. pp. 234-235.

The result of the collaboration was Mesh and was premiered to the public in the chamber music hall at the Concert Hall Aarhus on the 5th November, 2013.