Appendix 013

Appendix unpacks references, influences and themes from the week’s online programme and announcements. A Saturday digest of sound, video and written content from across the internet; Appendix is a digital reading, watching and listening list for the extra-curious.

i.) Read: The True Glamour of Clarice Lispector via The New Yorker
Benjamin Moser explores the life and work of Brazilian novelist and short story writer Clarice Lispector, whose The Passion According to G.H. inspired producer and composer Seb Gainsborough (aka Vessel)’s Passion, a work written whilst in residence at Somerset House Studios and presented at 2018’s ASSEMBLY. This Sunday we revisit an hour of music from Gainsborough and collaborator Rakhi Singh for our Deep Listen feature, in which the artists draw parallels between composers and musicians past and present – connecting Heinrich Biber with Lorenzo Senni, Jean-Phillippe Rameau with Actress and much more. 

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ii.) Watch: FLicKeR, Nik Sheehan
A documentary film based on the book Chapel of Extreme Experience by John G. Geiger about the work of artist Brion Gysin and his Dreamachine; a device that used a 100-watt light bulb, a motor, and a rotating cylinder with cutouts believed to offer the world a drugless high. Users would sit in front of it, close their eyes, and experience visions as a result of the flashes of light. Gysin believed the invention could revolutionize human consciousness.  

The Dreamachine is incorporated into this week’s PAUSE artwork-in-focus, Somnoproxy, by Studios residents Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard - a multi-sensory audio visual piece devised for your laptop and headphones to induce a hypnogogic state between waking and sleep, interwoven with a futuristic bedtime story.  

iii.) Read: Close Listening: Tracing the history of field recordings and electronic music via Crack
Musician and sound designer Ana Quiroga led Wednesday’s Mutant Promise workshop, in which she introduced participants to the basics of music production using soundscapes and field recordings. Touching on seminal works by Brian Eno, Bjork, KLF and more, here Crack give a cursory introduction to the history of field recording within the context of electronic music.

vi.) Listen: Three Preludes, Ana Quiroga
Released in March 2020, Three Preludes was created for a collaboration with filmmaker Pedro Maia as part of The 20/19 Project. Three arrangements featuring original sound compositions which include field recordings collected in the south eastern county of Kent and surrounding areas. Earlier this week, Ana hosted an introductory field recording and music production workshop as part of Mutant Promise’s programme with Somerset House Studios, which you can explore in full here.