Wall of Sound

Thanks to Seb for reminding me about this great website. I think we should make one of these about the existing Thomas Tallis School.

What do you think?

The Crate

The pop up gallery arrived this afternoon. It's first job is to star in a film about Dr. Who visiting Tallis and exploring its past, present & future. Then it's home to The Measurement Shop in a couple of weeks and, in the meantime, will become a portal and workshop space linking Tallis with the Beaconsfield Gallery.

You may have noticed that the gallery looks a lot like a packing crate (it even has "Fragile. This Way Up" stenciled on the side). This is deliberate. The space functions as a gallery/workshop when the doors are open but also as a sculptural object, referring to the fact that we will soon be packing up and moving to a brand new school. It was important to us that the gallery could be seen from the road, as you enter the concourse from the car park and from most of the rooms adjacent to the concourse.

What will you take with you to the new school? Will they be physical or emotional items?

Anne-Mette, one of our colleagues in Denmark, just sent me a link to this website. It's a series of YouTube videos that feature a range of instruments playing and sounds created. The visitor can create their own mix of the various sounds, each person generating a unique composition. It kept me amused and delighted for ages!

I wonder if we could borrow this idea to create our own interactive music website for Tallis, featuring our own musicians, instruments and sounds? We could try to incorporate the sounds of the building and film each musician in a variety of recognisable Tallis locations. This might then be projected during the 'Past, Present & Future' showcase events on 15th and 16th July so that visitors can make their own soundtracks. It can also be one of the artistic legacies of the old building, continuing to be played in the new one.

What do you think?

River Soundings

Bill Fontana, a leading sound artist, has spent several months gathering audio and video recordings of the river Thames from above and below ground. These have been collected together in a new installation at Somerset House in a project entitled 'River Sounding'. This Audioboo was made today with the help of my family as we explored the subterranean spaces of the building. Wouldn't it be great to create a similar exploration of our school, capturing its unique sounds and relaying them back to a visiting public during the summer festival of creativity which we're calling 'Past, Present & Future'?

What non human sounds do you most associate with Thomas Tallis School? Which parts of the building would create the most evocative set of noises? What's the difference between noise and music? What would be the best way to play these sounds back to an audience?

David Byrne on Creativity

There aren't may people in the world I am envious of but David Byrne, musician, artist, designer and all round creative guru, is one of them. This interview from the Tate Shots Sound & Vision series takes place in the Roundhouse in Camden against the backdrop of Byrne's amazing Playing the Building installation.

What I like about this interview is Byrne's understanding and exploitation of the inter-disciplinary nature of the arts. It's interesting to hear him talk about the influence of his art school education and the importance of the ideas articulated in The Bauhaus but also why it's almost impossible to be creative unless there are constraints or limitations that focus your energies. The footage of music and choreography combined also made me reflect on the amazing performances this week as part of the Ludus Residency at Tallis. I was really struck by the power of the music and dancing combined in the ID: Me production and wondered if we could encourage some kind of collaboration between dancers and musicians at Tallis this summer.

This video might make a good starting point for our next Visual, Media & Performing Arts faculty meeting. We're thinking about ways in which the work we present as part of this year's arts festival could, in some way, respond to the architecture and history of Thomas Tallis School. Byrne's installation at the Roundhouse, created from a series of pipes, mechanical gizmos and an old pump organ, is a brilliant example of the way in which this kind of art can transform our understanding of architectural space. The Roundhouse has been both a railway turning shed and a rock music venue. This work brings these two histories together. Playing the organ turns the whole building into a musical instrument and the sounds it makes evoke the noises of old locomotives. Brilliant!

Une nuit avec JR

Une nuit avec JR
by Narbru

This film is one of many you can find online that features the work of the French Photo Graffer, JR. His extended project entitled "28 Millimetres" is an exploration of wall-based gaffiti art using photography. He has worked all over the world, challenging stereotypes through the exhibition of massive portraits in public spaces. You can find out more about the work here.

I wonder if it would be possible to do something similar at Tallis? There are plenty of walls and a brand new hoarding that could provide an amazing canvas on which to project images like this. What are your thoughts? If we did attempt something on this scale, what issues could we address and whose portraits would be included?

Urban Curators

I've just stumbled across this interesting article about a project in the States entitled "Urban Curators". Here's the article in full:

"The goal of the Urban Curators project is to engage the public in the celebration of the decaying urban environment, recog- nizing its inherent aesthetic qualities as well as the important role that it plays within our cultural habitat. The project achieves its goal by elevating common, overlooked objects and spaces within the city of Providence, Rhode Island to the level of high art.

The project achieves this elevation by literally hanging gold, gallery-style frames in derelict spaces within the city, framing objects and views that are of aesthetic or cultural value. By utilizing frames that one might expect to find in an art museum or gallery, viewers are forced to make connections between the urban landscape and the museum environment. Viewers are likewise encouraged to reconsider their prior conceptions of beauty and worth, understanding that the spontaneity of decay offers an alternative aesthetic to excessive design.

Humans have for centuries sought after the grandeur of ruins that were once the glory of ancient cultures, recognizing them as windows into the lives of past civilizations. The Urban Curators project proposes that we should likewise cherish those ruins that reflect modern-day consumerism and industr- ialization, realizing them as vehicles by which we can gain insight into our own society.

The frames themselves are hung with double-sided hardware tape and are easily removed without harm to the spaces in which they are placed. While this is a necessary component of the project, it likewise means that each frame will hang only temporarily. Due to the transient nature of the project, its success requires time and effort from not only the Urban Curators team, but from the community as a whole. While the project was originally born by six Rhode Island School of Design students, it cannot continue without input and participation from others. We hope that the community will interact with the project – finding our frames, removing them, relocating them, and installing their own."

I wonder if this is something we could attempt at Tallis? Maybe we could ask folks to donate old frames they have lying about at home. The we could install these frames around the site on some of the distressed surfaces, conferring upon them the status of art. We could even create gallery labels like the ones used by the Urban Designers complete with spurious titles, dates and media. What do you think? Do any of you have any other ideas like this?

Play Me, I'm Yours

Touring internationally since 2008, ‘Play Me, I’m Yours’ is an artwork by artist Luke Jerram. the point of the artwork is to encourage people to "take ownership of their urban environment",

Presented for Sing London and the City of London Festival, 30 street pianos have been installed on streets, in public squares and parks, train stations, and markets. Like a creative blank canvas, the pianos are there for any member of the public to play and engage with. The pianos will be in place until July 13th, after which time they’ll be donated to local schools and community groups.

I think this is a really good idea and I can imagine a piano/pianos being placed around the school especially on the concourse would be interesting to see how many people can and will play the piano, and if any visitors, delivery people etc play them.

check out Play Me I'm Yours website to read and see more

 

Tangled Feet

Kat Joyce emailed today to suggest that we create a long list of ideas for the Tangled Feet residency. I said I'd put a post up here to get the ball rolling. So, what would you like to see happening between our volunteers and the Tangled Feet crew. Remember, the main theme is "Home", how we define it and what it means to us. The school is moving home within the next couple of years and folk at Tallis have a variety of feelings about the current home. Students will soon be moving to Tallis from their primary schools and Year 13 students have just left their Tallis home for university and world of work.

Also, it will be possible for groups of students and artists/performers to work on a range of projects simultaneously. For example, one group could devise a short site specific performance to be shown at lunchtime whilst another group could be preparing a soundscape and yet another might be designing an installation.

Please respond to this post with your suggestions for possible activities so that the folks at Tangled Feet can prepare themselves and we can all get hold of the necessary resources.

Finally, I think it's important to send a letter home to the parents of the selected 20 to inform them about the residency. Has this already happened or do we need to write something for Tuesday? Are we going to have reserves in case some people drop out before the 29th? Are you expecting to be part of the team who works with Tangled Feet? All this and more can be revealed in your comments.

Finally, finally, how do we plan to document the residency and evaluate whether or not it has been a success? Any thoughts?

Gleaming lights of souls

I came across this whilst surfing the net. It’s an art installation called “Gleaming Lights of the Souls” by the Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama where visitors are invited to enter a tardis-like chamber, when inside the small interior unfolds into a magical encounter with infinity. The small room is mirrored on all four sides, with a shallow pool of water on the floor. A changing collection of small LED lights hung from the ceiling produce a countless chain of endless reflections, transforming the small cube into an unearthly place. I really like the idea and think this could be another installation like the Eye and I project.

Tunnel 228

Today we went to see Tunnel 228. I wouldn't be able to give this enough credit by explaining it myself - it was absolutely amazing! I'll copy what a magazine has said about it and put up a couple of pictures. AMAZING!!! Made my day.

Tunnel 228 will run for 15 days from May 8. It is free to attend and sponsored by Bloomberg. The show promises to take audiences “on a sensory journey through art-installations, sculpture, live performance and vaults of mysterious curiosities”.

Like the city of Metropolis, Tunnel 228 divides the world into two social groups: one of planners or thinkers, who live high above ground and are oblivious to life underground. The other is a world of workers who live in the vaults of Tunnel 228 laboring to sustain the lives of those above ground. On arrival, audiences are issued with a protective mask, before setting off into the darkness to explore this subterranean world alone.

Tickets can be obtained free of charge by accessing Tunnel 228’s website and reserving a time slot to become a ‘worker’ at www.tunnel-228.com.

Kevin Spacey, Old Vic artistic director, said: “We are very excited to be working with Punchdrunk and such an amazing collection of artists. Punchdrunk creates immersive theatre like no other. Their imagination and magical touch with unusual spaces makes this the perfect collaboration. A big thank you to Bloomberg for sponsoring Tunnel 228, without their support this event would not be free to the public.”

Punchdrunk artistic director Felix Barrett added: “Punchdrunk always aims to let people rediscover the excitement and anticipation of exploring the unknown. When The Old Vic showed us the site we knew that this would be a truly unique collaboration. There are so many talented and innovative artists involved, and showcasing an event like this completely free to the public is especially incredible.”

Sound Ideas

I've just received (via my school email so apology for the slight delay) this interesting message from Mr Davids. He's been having a think about ways in which we could set up sound related installations in school. Here's what he has to say:

Phew - terms finally out, and I've been giving that collaboration a good old think.

With reference to working with a digital artist, I would be very happy to do that, and I already have a concept of something that I've wanted to do for a long time, but have had neither time nor the coding skills to implement it. Do we know of any visual artists who are proficient in coding who could be involved?

I would very much like to make an interactive installation -It would be loosely based around looping of captured audio and visual input, and then playing back, or projecting live after various delays/processing. The user would be able to see a visual and audio record of their movement over the last 30 seconds, and be able to interact with it live on a projection screen. The concept links together video, audio, time/space and movement, and will hopefully encourage people to interact with the installation, and with each other.

1. Video installation with video delays/multiple copies.
Cloning and delays with visuals
Playmodes
Time Tunnel

These are some inspirations for this idea. The 'Through Time Tunnel' is an installation which has been custom coded, and is not available for download, but it looks incredible. I love the concept of the users being able to interact with past versions of themselves, and explore live choreography. Some of the aspects of this could be done with Isadora, but my 30 day trial has expired. I think it would be a shrewd purchase for the Arts College, as it is very flexible and can be used for lots of interactive installation/VJing. To produce something like the Time Tunnel would be a fairly hefty piece of coding I'd imagine, and we'd need to work with a programmer.

2. Audio Loop Room.
I've already experimented with looping sound Ableton Live and Looping using a free application called Sooper Looper for the Mac, which can be controlled via midi input, which I've already mentioned, can be done through Wii remotes / coloured balls / pretty much anything. Sam Murray and I have talked about this, and reckon that it can easily be done. For example, a rolling loop of 30 seconds could capture ambient noise in the room, and then playback with a delay and processing, with multiple layers of mini-loops playing over the top, sped up, slowed down. A number of objects in the room could be used to alter various parameters of the looping. Wiimotes, coloured lights etc. By embedding these controllers within tactile objects in the space, the users will have control (unconscious though it may be) of the parameters of that particular room. If visual feedback is needed, we could use something like Whitecap, G-Force or R4 to output video based on the sound.

3. Painting with light.
We spoke about this one or two years ago - It would be very easy to set up a live video feed, which let frames persist, allowing people to paint with LEDs/torches. Depending on how long the buffer is, you can build up extensive pictures, or short trails.

As long as we capture with a camera which has a long shutter speed, we can do this live, I think.

Another way to do this is to use the virtual graffiti tool, available for mac. Graffiti Research Lab LASER Tag. I've used this at parties and the like. All you need is a laptop, camera, projector and a laser pen, or LED lights, and people can paint virtual graffiti on any surface, as long as you can project onto it (legally).

I know this a lot to digest at once, but I've been in thought about it, and I'd definitely want to get at least one of these concepts working so people can have a play with it.

Tell me what you think.

Ugly Knitting

The fabulous Ujino Muneteru (Ujino and The Rotators) has two works on display on the Southbank at the moment. Ugly Knitting (above) is upstairs in the Project Space at The Hayward Gallery whilst Sherbert Dab Swivel (below) is on show outside the Royal Festival Hall.

The YouTube video of Ugly Knitting doesn't quite do it justice since there are about four or five separate "instruments" which play in sequence. I was particularly impressed by the turntables which spun records with bits of wood spouting from the surface of the vinyl. As the disk turned, each of the pegs struck a metal switch creating a syncopated beat. Very clever.

Perhaps we could install something like this in a classroom in our summer project? Mike Shaw, the art technician and artist in residence at Tallis, is a very well-respected sonic artist (I think that's the right term) who performs as DJ Tendraw. He is a master of turntablism and does all kinds of wonderful things with records. He's also created soundscapes for other exhibitions and has attempted to teach the art of circuit bending at Tallis. It might be cool to commission Mike to help us interfere with the sounds of the building in various ways. He has some other cool ideas about how we might encourage people to re-imagine the school. Shall I invite him to a future meeting?