This week I completed the majority of the tasks of Phase Zero. Ordering most of the components needed and thinking out many important elements before I am able to start composing and doing practical research.
Accumulation of Components
I have continued to source components necessary for the hopeful construction of my speaker system.
This week I have ordered:
- 17 Ultrasound transducers.
- A MOSFET driver also known as an operational amplifier or a pre-amp.
- Two Operational Amplifiers - one is the one used online and another is an upgraded component. They were both affordable so I decided to buy both to potentially compare fidelity.
I still need to source:
- A 3.5mm stereo audio jack
- A bluetooth adaptor for the stereo jack
- A usb to 9V power adaptor
I have also updated and revised the layout of the information on my practical Research Log to make it more digestible. here is a table of the components:
I have also sourced relevant code and information of how to program the code onto the device, and completed the Accumulation and Planning tasks of Phase Zero.
Phase Zero: Theory
Key Headers of Research draft:
Introduction
Contextual Review
Methods of curation - throughout history and in contemporary art in response to art movements such as land art and installation. A wholistic look at the white cube's place within a history and dialogue of curation.
Spectres and Ghosts - A look at the different types of bodies which haunt the gallery space, exploring Hauntology.
Acousmatic Sound - Engaging with these ideas through a physical practice that both informs my research and is informed by it.
Sounds that haunt - investigating how and why sound haunts the gallery space, through artists and critics of the aesthetic and the genre alike. Comparing alternate models of sound to Hauntology in more depth.
Artistic Review: Pierre Huyghe
A research Project is itself haunted by questions. Questions that make you wonder, if only the building itself could speak, what would it say?
In Pierre Huyghe's work 'Timekeeper' (1999), The artist sands down the matte white walls of the white cube walls. Revealing in the walls layers of colours, each associated with its own exhibition in the specific gallery's history.
One aspect of the work I really like, is that it combats the notion of the gallery as a non-place.
The white walls are painted to separate artworks from the its context, just as there are often no windows. The matte white walls construct a space in which the focus is driven away from the enclosing architecture and when one stands in a white cube space, they could be anywhere in the world at any time and not know the difference. Timekeeper is a symbolic ritual that combats this, revealing not only the raw architecture of the institution but the history of exhibitions that have come before. Inviting a surreal sense of time into the space, one which is embodied by layers of paint that haunt the architecture from beneath the matte coats of white.
Through these layers, there are large areas of pure white, showing clearly the dominance of the white wall throughout the history of the space. The act of sanding sculpts the space without adding anything new to it, it uncovers an almost spectral image of the exhibitions that came before. A spectral image of time that is constructed within the walls of the institution itself, therefore combatting the illusion of timelessness.
I would like to reflect further on this work and may choose to included it in my Thesis as an example of an artwork that invites time into the space and reveals how the institution is itself haunted by time in this way.
Critical Review: Carsten Höller
German artist's Test Site (2006) installs a set of 5 slides in the Turbine Hall of the Tate Modern art gallery in London. While the work itself is an exploration of madness, fun and architecture, what is important to me is how the artist explores his own 'research' through an exhibition format.
Titling the work 'Test Site', the work becomes an experiment. An idea or concept is promised to be investigated in both its installation but also in its engagement.
Höller describes the artwork as really a 'large scale experiment', to see how slides would function in public spaces, how they are received and what they do to both users and viewers. the passive set up of the work as an exploration of impact on audience as being the defining aspect of the work marks it as a research practice. This aspect and its passivity reminds me of Marina Abramovic's Rhythm 0, in which her work's affect from its audience both fulfilled and proved the point she made. It was not itself a commentary, but it enabled a commentary to be made through the audience's response to the opportunity.
Perhaps any research practice should be constructed with this in mind. Instead of saying 'this sound work challenges the aesthetic'. Perhaps more broad questions should be asked to the audience such as:
- 'What is the effect of the work on the audience?'
- 'Does the work bring attention to the space?' OR 'How does the space affect the work?'
- 'How do audiences interact with the space/ sound differently?
"It’s a ‘test site’ in the sense of a study using volunteers in a museum space. The tests are conducted by visitors themselves, there is no ‘objective’ authority taking measurements. It’s all personal experience." Carsten Höller (Tate Modern Interview)
In this interview, when asked what the artist thought about the art gallery space, Höller says that he approaches the space as somewhere to experiment with concepts and ideas. This reminds me of the hypothetical plane which Foucault speaks of. Defining his opinion of the gallery as similarly a non-place in which ideas are in conversation, before they are implemented in the real world.
He also speaks of light as being important to the work, in the same way that Cage remarks Rauschenberg's are airports of light. Test Site (2006) fills the volume within a white wall institution, but through its reflections of the space and its own shadow, he claims it projects the outside world onto the walls.
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