highlike

Kenny Wong

Squint
file festival
I was inspired by how the sunlight bounces around in our artificial forest.
“Squint” is a kinetic light installation consisting of 49 mirrors that reflect lights in a bright space. The mirrors track and reflect lights on audiences’ face with composed patterns of movements. It extends the generated perception by focusing on how lights pass across our visual senses physically, and combines with our perception of images through flickering. “Squint”, which extracts various daily experiences to an abstraction brings the audience to expand their interpretation of lights and perceived imagination into a non-linear experience.
“Squint” simulates light source and intentionally shines lights on audience’s faces. Bright light is projected in the gallery, a clean bright space.
Everyday people are dynamically moving around in the city. Sunlight reflects and flickers even when it is indirect and hidden behind the artifacts. While we are traveling, we are experiencing motion. We are also experiencing the shift of light intensity, visual patterns and textures. The varieties of light forms inspire the artist to explore the potential of light textures, select and sort out the combined complexity in urban space. The artist turns them into a minimal form of light experience, while maximizing its diversity of perception.

LIN HWAI-MIN

White Water and Dust
White Water and Dust, a rare double bill by the internationally renowned choreographer Lin Hwai-min, brings great intensity of contrast between the two works. While White Water, set to piano music by Erik Satie, flows like a movable celebration of life, Dust, to a powerful rendering of Shostakovich’s String Quartet No. 8, evokes a memory of Goya’s Black Paintings.

Christian Babski, Stéphane Carion, Christophe Guignar & Patrick Keller

Satellite Daylight
Satellite Daylight is an interactive light installation formed by a trapeze of 24 high-voltage neon tubes tapering upwards, created by fabric | ch – a studio for architecture, interaction and research dedicated to investigating contemporary space based in Lausanne. The installation is connected to data collected in real time from online weather stations and meteorological satellite maps, which therefore translate actual global light conditions picked up by satellites orbiting the earth at the latitude of Basel into an endless loop of perceivable electrical intensity.

fabric | ch

Perpetual (Tropical) Sunshine
Perpetual (Tropical) Sunshine is an architectural, climatic and temporal installation. Thanks to a “screen” composed of several hundred infrared light bulbs, Perpetual (Tropical) Sunshine retransmits the journey and intensity of the sun as perceived on the 23rd parallel south, according to information transmitted live by weather stations all around the Tropic of Capricorn. Perpetual (Tropical) Sunshine thereby creates a displaced architectural space, which confronts the visitor with an abstract form of day and endless summer. It represents the increasingly artificial nature of our environment and suggests a form of “static mobility” or “displaced tropicality”.

Ramy Fischler & Cyril Teste

Exformation, an interactive installation inspired by the concept of “exformation,” was developed for a composition by Jesper Nordin performed by the Diotima string quartet and combines musical, luminous and colorimetric scores. Around the musicians, positioned on a technically equipped stage, three aluminium-edged cubes with LEDs mounted on circular rails move and angle their light in keeping with an algorithmic programme based on analysis of the spectrum, timbre and intensity of the music. This sensitive object becomes a total composition, a poetic, digital entity responding to the work played at its centre.

David Bowen

Tele-Present Water
This installation draws information from the intensity and movement of the water in a remote location. Wave data is being collected in real-time from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration data buoy station 46075 Shumagin Islands Alaska (53°54’39” N 160°48’21” W). The wave intensity and frequency is scaled and transferred to the mechanical grid structure resulting in a simulation of the physical effects caused by the movement of water from this distant location.

Lerata and Arts Brookfield

Lumibolic
Lumibolic is an interactive and occupiable environment shaped from hyperbolic paraboloid geometries. Its luminous surfaces are composed of strands of glowing EL wire that modulate their form and intensity in response to sound and motion inputs. Designed to generate dynamic visual vibrations inspired by the work of Op-Artists Bridget Riley and Victor Vasarely, the piece visualizes relationships between site and visitor on a large scale.

geoffrey mann

Cross-fire cutlery detail
The focus of the Past, Present & Future Craft practice commission was to examine the intangible characteristic of the spoken word and investigate the unseen affect of sound upon its inhabited environment.The project centralizes around the context of a domestic argument. In this case the event samples an audio excerpt from the 1999 Sam Mendes Film ‘American Beauty’. The slow building dialogue between the three central characters family dinner climaxes with a sound clash of emotions. The cross-fire of the argument traverses the dinning table but where previously the inanimate everyday objects such as plates, cutlery, teapot etc were unable to express their character, the intensity of the conversation deforms their once static existence into objects of unseen familiarity.The presented sound artifacts each encapsulate a momentary emotion of the argument.

Oscar Sol

Trinity
Trinity is an audiovisual interactive dance piece which tells the journey of a body going through different states of perception of the space. Through movement, the body is immersed in an environment of textures and audiovisual landscapes that not only accompany but will push to a transformation process.This work proposes a profound, clear and efficient interaction between its three elements: the triad of movement, sound and visuals. This interaction is understood as a dialogue which passes through different levels of intensity and transformations throughout the piece and is focused in the detection of the following qualities and patterns of movement like: forces and directions, acceleration, position, speed and body area.

Circus Family

Triph
“When left alone with no audience, the object glows dimly as if it were asleep. Yet when visitors approach, the installation slowly comes back to life. Colour gradients pour into each shape, whilst mirrored surfaces start reflecting light – all to the orchestra of an encompassing soundscape. This project invites visitors to become part of something. An immersive light experience in which the audience directs the intensity, audio and colour palettes simply by approaching, moving around in and between the large geometric shapes of the installation. Truly, a merging of art, interaction design, sound, tech and vision. As visual architects, our aim with ‘TRIPH” is to demonstrate that a number of different techniques can be combined into a mix of unexpected shapes and materials, that in turn help to create a new truly unique way of experiencing a story. Both in daylight condition and at night. With our self-initiated work, we aim to find undiscovered methods of narrative, questioning the ways people discover and open themselves up to new conceptual work.” Circus Family

Erwin Redl

Matrix Paris
Matrix Paris is a fully immersive and experiential light installation. The visitors walk into a maze of LED lights distributed over two floors. The colors of the lights slowly change between red and blue. These colors delineate the visible color spectrum as well as the spectrum of our human emotion with red as the most sensual color and blue as the cool, rational counterpoint. The corporeal intensity of the immersive aesthetic experience combined with the underlying technological aspects of a highly sophisticated binary logic blurs the border between the virtual and the real.

ANTOINE GOLDSCHMIDT & OFER SMILANSKY

HYMN
Based on Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Hymn of Cherubim, the work explores in an abstract way the relationship between man and machine, ancient and modern, harmony and chaos. By associating the harmonic purity of the voices with the almost tangible intensity of lasers, HYMN invites us to a timeless journey, where sound and light are transformed into an immersive, intense and sensitive experience.

Christine Ödlund

The Admiral’s Garden
Christine Ödlund’s work explores the borders of our knowledge of the world around us, connecting such themes as the chemical communication of plants, synaesthesia and theosophy. She works in a variety of media, including drawing, sculpture, video, watercolour and sound works.
Stress Call of the Stinging Nettle: When a plant reacts to a butterfly larvae feeding on its leaves, it releases chemical substances, or compounds. The characteristics of these compounds have been analyzed in collaboration with the Ecological Chemistry Research Group at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, and then transposed into amplitude and intensity of sinus tones, recorded at EMS (Electroacoustic Music in Sweden), Stockholm. Thus these beautiful graphic score and soundtrack by Swedish artist Christine Ödlund are direct transpositions of “the plant’s life, struggle and death”.

lera auerbach

ICARUS
The National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain
conducted by Mark Wigglesworth
“What makes this myth so touching is Icarus’s impatience of the heart, his wish to reach the unreachable, the intensity of the ecstatic brevity of his flight and inevitability of his fall. If Icarus were to fly safely – there would be no myth. His tragic death is beautiful. It also poses the question – from Deadalus‘ point of view – how can one distinguish success from failure? Deadalus‘ greatest invention, the wings which allowed a man to fly, was his greatest failure as they caused the death of his son. Deadalus was brilliant, his wings were perfect, but he was also a blind father who did not truly understand his child.” LERA AUERBACH

IANNIS XENAKIS

Terretektorh
Terretektorh shows more concern for harmonic organization than the earlier, iconoclastic Pithoprakta, with its scatterings of knocking sounds and massed effects. Still, the concentration is decidedly on texture and movement, with narrow lines being bundled with a number of others in the same register to create a rawer sonic intensity that still has some basis in melody. Xenakis concentrates on the high and low registers, as did Varèse before him, and adds some unusual sound effects into the mix as well.

In Terretektorh and Persephassa, Xenakis creates the impression of movement by transferring musical material between groups of musicians using techniques developed from musique concrète. These works are further innovative because of the unique seating arrangements in which the space for the performers and audience are superimposed.
In this thesis,  demonstrating Xenakis’s early approach to spatial composition. The thesis builds on the work of other scholars and provides more insight as to how these fascinating pieces work.

kirilian photograph

In 1939, the technique came to be known, in the Soviet Union, under the name “Kirlian effect”, in honor of Semyon Davidovich Kirlian, rediscoverer of the same. The method consists of photographing an object with a photographic plate, submitted to high-voltage and high-frequency electric fields, but with low current intensity. The result is the appearance of an aura, or rather, a “luminous halo” around objects, whatever it may be, regardless of whether it is organic or inorganic.

henk stallinga

Chain Reaction
This monumental light sculpture from Henk Stallinga is a composition of 144 circle lights. The intensity of the individual lights gradually varies from a subtle glow to an intense bright light. During the course of one natural day, this circle of light ‘moves’ up the chain, providing the visitor with a sense of time.

BARRY X BALL

БАРРИ Х БОЛЛ
Purity
Ball’s portraits are marked by a kind of hyper-compressed energy and visceral intensity that sends your mind reeling. Your thoughts vacillate between the likeness of the sitter, the aesthetic qualities of the stone, and the odd contortions of the form — even though you are completely baffled about how these objects came into existence. more

DAAN BRINKMANN

16 pillars

Skinstrument is a musical instrument which can be played by two players. By means of a tiny imperceptible current the players become part of a circuit. When the players touch each other on the skin this circuit starts to generate sound. The intensity of the touch determines the frequency of the sound.

Peter Flemming

Canoe
The work here in Dawson is like an old vehicle in which I’ve put a new engine. Entitled Canoe, it consists of an approximately 20 foot long trough of water, that resembles some kind of boat. This provides a means for a gunwales tracking mechanism to slowly, endlessly paddle its way back and forth. It was first constructed in 2001 in a studio beside Halifax harbour. It draws visual inspiration from the bridges and water vessels of this port. Conceptually, it grew from an interest in technological obsolescence: how things (like canoes) make shifts from utility to leisure.
It has experienced several major rebuilds since 2001. Most of them have been practical, but for Dawson I’ve opted for an experimental configuration that changes significantly the nature of the work. Previously, Canoe has only ever been shown indoors. Normally in runs on rechargeable batteries, with a continuous, smooth motion. In Dawson, it is shown outdoors, alongside the Yukon river, showing up in an absurd way the paleness of its artificial river. Here, the primary source of power is sunlight.
Making use of the long northern day, solar panels receive light, storing energy in an array of super-capacitor cells. At this time, Canoe remains still. A custom circuit monitors the amount of charge, and when a predetermined trigger point is reached, it is dumped into Canoe’s electric motor in a burst, allowing it to make a few strokes. Then Canoe rests, while the charging cycle begins again. Motion is intermittent, entirely dependent on the amount and intensity of sunlight. It ranges from near standstill in overcast conditions to perhaps 1 or 2 strokes every minute in full light. The technical term for this type of circuit is a relaxation oscillator. I like this term because, if you remove it from its technical context, it points back to ideas about leisure and utility.

Robert Irwin

Double Blind

Double Blind is Irwin’s response to the characteristic features of the main gallery at the Secession. The room’s absence of windows makes it a neutral container for art, its hermetically sealed quality enhancing the impression of a massive, isolated volume. The grid structure of the ceiling and floor underscore the room’s austere appearance and lend it rhythm. The world outside nonetheless becomes tangible through the daylight streaming in from above. The changing intensity of light in the room allows visitors to sense different times of day and what are frequently rapid changes in the weather. The installation Double Blind consists of thirty room-high frames with translucent fabric stretched over them following exactly the lines of the grids that define the room and thus forming three volumes. Depending on where the viewer is standing and on the direction and intensity of the light, the appearance of the installation changes, as does that of the room itself. The door to the garden behind the Secession building stands open, allowing the viewer to see and sense the world outside.

HENRYK GORECKI

הנריק גורצקי
헨릭 고 레츠 키
亨里克·戈雷茨基
ヘンリク·グレツキ
Хенрик Гурецкий
symphony of sorrowful songs

Symphony no.3, Symphony of Sorrowful Songs is an hour-long work that demands the attention of the listener. It is made up of three movements, all labelled Lento, their slow, deliberate pace having a ritualistic prayer-like quality, with the intensity of Gregorian chant. They have an extremely slow deliberate harmonic progression and build to a slow controlled climax.

TOYO ITO

تويو ايتو
伊东丰雄
טויו איטו
伊東豊雄
도요 이토
Tower of Winds
During the day the perforated metal panels that cover the Tower of Winds reflect the city image and make the design appear humble and simple. But during the night, it gets lit up in an ever-changing combination of light intensity and colors. Using computer software, the lighting follows the wind speed and noise levels changing the Tower’s appearance accordingly. The Tower of Winds features more than 1300 light bulbs and 42 flood lights and neon rings (on each floor). The small lights change their colors according to the wind’s noise level and the rings change their intensity according to its speed.
Basically, the Tower of the Winds by Toyo Ito is a wind indicator in a constant relationship with the city and the natural environment, a junction between the two. It is placed at the train station area, welcoming the passengers arriving in Yokohama and its functional role is accommodating another natural element. Surprisingly the Tower of Winds houses the water tanks for the air-conditioning system of the underground mall below. The Tower is not a new construction, but a re-designing of an old concrete tower that already existed there since the ‘60s.

Ballet Preljocaj

AND THEN, ONE THOUSAND YEARS OF PEACE
And Then, One Thousand Years of Peace is a huge, ambitious monolith of a work. First created by Angelin Preljocaj for the Bolshoi Ballet in 2010, it takes inspiration from the vision of apocalypse conjured by St John in the biblical Book of Revelation.There are no horses galloping across the stage or horned beasts. But Preljocaj sets himself a barely less daunting task: choreographing the essential meaning of apocalypse, as a cataclysm so profound it lays bare the very essence and history of human nature.Preljocaj launches his work with a shattering opening sequence. Ten women drive through hard, slicing, geometric formations; lights flash, electro-percussive music reverberates; and the air becomes as thick and swarming as a tropical thunderstorm as the movement accelerates towards its convulsive climax.Out of this intensity emerges a Garden of Eden tranquillity, where men lope and flutter in delicately animalistic moves, and two women in white tunics play like lazy cherubs.

Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos and realities:united

Contemporary Art Centre in Cordoba
BUILDING FAÇADE WITH AN INTEGRATED LIGHT AND MEDIA INSTALLATION

To transform the façade into a light and media display without fundamentally changing its solid appearance as envisioned by Nieto Sobejano turned out to be the biggest challenge in the project. The façade is accordingly designed to deliver a tactile and solid appearance in the daytime while it turns at night into a unique and dynamic communication wall that reacts very specifically to the architecture. The 100-meter façade consists of 1,319 hexagonal, recessed and pre-fabricated “bowls” on different scales. Each of the bowls serves as a reflector for an integrated artificial light source. The intensity of each lamp can be controlled individually, forming a huge irregular low-resolution grey scale display. The thorough immersion of the “pixel-bowls” – like negative impressions – in the volume of the façade turns the architectural scheme itself into a digital information carrier. During the day, the façade shows a three-dimensional landscape with no sign of being a media facade. Additionally, this tectonically modulated surface topography is characterized by a playful composition of light and shadow that constantly changes with the movement of the sun.

BARRY X BALL

БАРРИ Х БОЛЛ
Ball’s portraits are marked by a kind of hyper-compressed energy and visceral intensity that sends your mind reeling. Your thoughts vacillate between the likeness of the sitter, the aesthetic qualities of the stone, and the odd contortions of the form — even though you are completely baffled about how these objects came into existence. more

FLORIAN HECKER

فلوريان هيكر
フロリアン·ヘッカー
Sound Installation
In his installations, live performances and publications, Florian Hecker deals with specific compositional developments of post-war modernity, electroacoustic music as well as other, non-musical disciplines. He dramatizes space, time and self-perception in his sonic works by isolating specific auditory events in their singularity, thus stretching the boundaries of their materialization.
Their objectual autonomy is exposed while simultaneously evoking sensations, memories and associations in an immersive intensity. Some of his works incorporate psycho-acoustic phenomena, disorienting listeners’ spatial perceptions and expanding their conception about sound. Hecker’s most recent recording, Speculative Solution ( Editions Mego, 2011), brings together Hecker’s sonic practice and psychoacoustic experimentation with philosopher Quentin Meillassoux’s concept of ‘hyperchaos’ – the absolute contingency of the laws of nature.
During his residency at MIT, Florian Hecker will research a new sound piece that takes the concept of the “auditory chimera” as point of departure. Originally developed at MIT by Bertrand Delgutte, senior research scientist at the MIT Research Laboratory of Electronics, the concept of the auditory chimera inspires an exploration of the relationship between pitch perception and sound localization. Hecker will create a text and sound piece that incorporates the recordings of material read by students. Using an anechoic chamber he will work with students to explore the experiential nature of psycho-acoustic practice.

DAAN BRINKMANN

Skinstrument
File Festival

Skinstrument is a musical instrument which can be played by two players. By means of a tiny imperceptible current the players become part of a circuit. When the players touch each other on the skin this circuit starts to generate sound. The intensity of the touch determines the frequency of the sound.