Performed at Signal+NoiseMedia Art Festival, VIVO Media Arts Centre, Vancouver
Experiments and Observations on different Types of Air, is an audio/video collaboration comprised of video of a re-creation of an inaccurate, though visually striking, 18th century experiment devised to help understand the underlying cause of the Aurora Borealis with sound elements comprised of field recordings and electronic stimulation of different “airs”. The experiment consists of a tight beam of sunlight which passes through a prism, then vapor cloud, which is in turn agitated by the motion of air being pushed at rhythmic intervals by speakers placed on each side of the cloud. This footage is layered with that of a water droplet, a natural lens and prism, being pushed by a beam of highly compressed air creating striking visual explorations of motion, the very basis of sound. During live performance the composite footage is passed through an old CRT (cathode ray tube) monitor, which is then distorted and played with by the electromagnetic pull of powerful hand held magnets being passed around the body of the monitor. A pull which passes invisibly through the air not unlike sound. Field recordings and samples of different “airs” such as the city air at night, day and early morning, pompous self gratifying conversation, radios between stations and a chorus of balloons being filled and emptied are manipulated in time via the chance operation of scanning the sample, releasing small bursts of the material from its digital coil and transforming it into “air”, as one would scan between stations of radio air, within the underlying 120 bpm structure. The very act of sound propagation is the disturbance of molecules and transfer of energy through that which we know as “air”. Sara Gold will be performing the audio element and Fazail Lutfi, the visual.
Sara Gold
Sara Gold suffers from a torrid and erratic past of an eclectic collection of analogue minimalist performances, loop based digital stimulus and other varied services for such organizations as Vancouver New Music, The New Forms Media Society and Her Jazz Noise Collective, as well as organizing and curating independent events since 2005. Her hobbies include collecting sounds and wallpaper, playing with magnetic tape and finding the resonant frequency of buildings.