Installations: LMY-7-10 (Crónica 179~2022, digital) von @c ist Musik, um dazu „Installations / Instalações“ (Crónica 181~2022 / i2ADS, 210 p Book) von MIGUEL CARVALHAIS & PEDRO TUDELA zu lesen, den beiden Crónica-Machern, deren klanginstallatives Werk da von 2005 an essayistisch und illustrativ aufgefächert wird. Die Musik entspricht der beim Fes- tival Serralves em Festa in der dortigen Kapelle. Deren kleiner, von einem großen Rund- fenster erleuchteter Saal bildet die horizontale Achse, der Turm, aus dessen dunklem Treppenaufgang Lichter an langen Schnüren herabhängen, die vertikale. Im Saal hängt ebenfalls an langen Schnüren eine horizontale Röhre. Von den Lichtern her und aus der Röhre sind dort wohl die Klänge erklungen, plinkende Harfenklänge in morphender, perkussiv bebender und vor- wie rückwärts rutschender Bewegung. Angeregt wurden die beiden Portugiesen dabei von LaMonte Youngs ‘Composition 1960 #7’ – zwei Tönen mit der Anweisung »to be held for a long time« – und ‘Composition 1960 #10 (“to Bob Morris”)’ – »draw a straight line and follow it«. Diesen Textkompositionen, in denen der Fluxus-Vogel piept, sei, so wie Cages „4:33“ die Unstille, die fernöstliche Weisheit zu entnehmen, dass, auch wenn man es noch so sehr wünscht und versucht, nichts sich stillstellen, nichts fest- halten lässt. Wie Konfuzius sagt: Das Leben und die Welt sind diskontinuierlich.
Mit Life of a Potato (Crónica 180~2022, gelbe C-30) macht Dr. MATILDE MEIRELES das Leben und Wesen einer ordinären Grumm’bere, wie wir in Unterfranken sagen, hörbar. Als Postdoctoral Researcher Fellow an der University of Oxford im Projekt ‘Sonorous Cities: Towards a Sonic Urbanism’ (SONCITIES) sind Scholle und Knolle eigentlich nicht ihr Thema. Allerdings hat es sie gelegentlich schon aufs Land gezogen, etwa zum Slieve Gullion oder in die Marble Arch Caves in Nordirland – sie hat in Belfast promoviert. Dort, wo Spuds und Crisps immer noch angesagt sind, hat sie wohl auch von An Gorta Mór gehört, der Irischen Kartoffelpest 1845-49, in der eine Million verhungerten und zwei Millionen vorm Verhungern flohen (‘Thousands are Sailing’ sangen die Pogues, und Primordial von ‘The Coffin Ships’) – eine Ungeheuerlichkeit, die noch in „Black 47“ und „Arracht“ nachhallt. Meireles, die von zuhause Batata portuguesa und Batatas ao murra kennt, spielt mit Klängen, die sie von einem Acker bei Pewsey in Wiltshire ausgrub: Mit holzigem Scharren und Beben, eisernem Klacken, dumpfem Kollern, der Regen plätschert, Vögel piepsen. Und sie bereitet was zu essen, schneidet rohe Kartoffeln, Tauben gurren, ein kleines Flugzeug brummt, Krähen krächzen, Spatzen tschilpen. B-seits wummern und pulsen Wellen auf dröhnendem Fond, gebackene Kartoffeln britzeln und brutzeln zu monotonem Klopfen und einem groovigen Loop, mit Schlagzeug sogar, und auch die Vögel hört man wieder piepsen und flattern, den Flieger brummen. Kartoffeln haben Augen, aber seit wann haben sie Ohren? [BA 114 rbd]
Pedro Tudela and Miguel Carvalhais collaborate as @c since 2000. They have released and performed extensively, often collaborating with other artists and collectives in a practice marked by radical experimentalism with computational sound. In 2003 they established Crónica, a label dedicated to experimental music and sound art, that they since run.
Since 2005 Tudela and Carvalhais have also been developing sound installations, the majority of which are ephemeral works lasting for the duration of an event or festival. The book Installations / Instalações documents nineteen of these works, offering a detailed look at them through visual documentation and texts by Carvalhais and Tudela and Raquel Castro, sound art curator and artistic director of Lisboa Soa.
This book is complemented by a series of releases that Crónica began publishing in 2021 — the first two being Installations: Seis Elementos (Crónica 174~2021) and Installations: LMY-7-10 (Crónica 179~2022) — and that will document these works by dedicating one album to each.
Book, 210 pages
155 x 230 mm, softcover
140 images
First edition of 500 copies in English and Portuguese
ISBN: 978-989-9049-13-0
Co-published by i2ADS
Main sponsor dstgroup
Table of contents:
Installations (2005, 2021), Miguel Carvalhais & Pedro Tudela
Instalações (2005, 2021), Miguel Carvalhais & Pedro Tudela
The next one is also a book, also (a bit of) a problem. This time, the text is in Portuguese and English, so that’s not the issue here. I like to think our principal interest is sound; we can hear on whatever sound carrier (don’t send your VHS tapes, please, or 8-track cassettes). Reading about sound already gets a bit more complicated, especially when it comes to theory. Still, in the case of Pedro Tudela and Miguel Carvalhais ‘Installations’, we deal with an art catalogue. You may know them as the duo @C, of whom we reviewed various releases over the years. They are a laptop duo rooted in field recordings, acoustic sound and improvisation. Another interest of theirs is the creation of installations. Since 2005 they did a few, and they are documented in this 210 pages softcover book, with 140 images, plus texts describing these and a more general introduction. It is undoubtedly a fascinating read, and the installations look fantastic, but it is not the ‘real’ thing. We miss a great deal of the experience, the sight and the sound. There are now two releases on the Cronica Bandcamp page that deal with two of these installations, and I strongly recommend playing these while flipping/reading this book (links below, they’re both ‘name your price downloads’). I know you’d still miss out on the visual side of the experience, but at least there is something to hear when looking at the pictures and reading the text. (FdW)
From a Central European perspective, the potato is actually an exotic plant: originally it was only found in South America. In »Life of a Potato«, sound artist Matilde Meireles considers the migratory movements of food as well as its cultural coding. Field recordings from a garden in the south-west of England serve as the source material for a two-part work divided into a concrete and an abstract side. It discreetly questions the alleged banality of domestic activities related to food.
Shortly after his release as Skrika on Cryo Chamber, Monty Adkins treats us with a surprise release on Cronica that musically represents almost the opposite of Skrika’s ‘dark ambient’. 46 Minutes of field recordings, enhanced (I wanted to write ‘enlovelied’, but I guess that isn’t a word) by Adkins’s soundscapes that turn it into an otherworldly experience.
The invader referred to here is the rhododendron tree which “was introduced to the UK by colonial botanists in the late 19th century as an ornamental plant, it is now seen as a highly invasive species by ecologists.”
The rhododendron originally comes from China, the motherland of Yan Wang Preston, who in March 2020 decided “to photograph a single rhododendron tree every other day at half an hour before sunset, for a year”. The (environmental) sounds included were recorded on the same location each month.
“Living as an immigrant in a country going through Brexit and COVID, Yan felt a strong personal connection with such invasive plants. They remind her of her homeland as well as the complex perceptions around nature, national identities, landscapes and migration.”
Like the seasons changing throughout the year, the 46-minute composition has a natural, uninterrupted flow. But in fact, it is highly dynamic: it is as changeable as the weather itself.
Comparing the Skrika album to his work on With Love, From An Invader shows the versatility of Monty Adkins as artist and sound designer. This can be no real surprise for those familiar with his previous releases.
I have found no links to the visual result of Yan Wang Preston‘s project, so we’ll have to do with the cover image. And with the images that Monty Adkins‘ soundscape evokes.
Oh, and by the way: this is a Name Your Price release!
We’re proud to present Matilde Meireles’s new release in Crónica, “Life of a Potato”, now available as a limited release tape, as a download, or stream.
The potato has travelled a long way from its native lands in South America. The starchy tuber, brought to Europe by the Spanish in the late 1600s, slowly settled to become a key ingredient in most European countries’ traditional diet. As with many other vegetables, plants, and spices from elsewhere, we forgot the origins of the potato. We made them our own because food is an inherent expression of social identity. It tells stories, and evokes nostalgia, belonging, and wellbeing. Yet, the food system of the current times is desperately unsustainable. Like the potato, many other fruits, vegetables, plants, and animals travel far and wide daily, blurring territories, and playing an accidental part in the immeasurable impact of the politics of food production. The potato is an incredibly resilient element whose history traverses time and location, and its historical traces have very different socio-political nuances in the places I call home: Portugal, Ireland, and now England. It also grows seasonally in our garden and is a tasty tuber part of a rich sonic ecosystem. This seemed like a good starting point for a new project.
Life of a Potato uses a series of field recordings to unveil varied sonic perspectives of a garden near Pewsey in the Southwest of England. Here potatoes grow seasonally alongside other vegetables, plants, bushes, and flowers. The field recordings include vibrations of the soil underground, potato stems as well as the stems of other vegetables, reeds, vibrations picked up through the rake, the garden in the sun and rain. The recordings were made between April and August 2021 as the tubers grew into potatoes and then were shared at the table. Side A explores the various sounds around the garden and sounds of the repetitive, yet enjoyable, task of roasting the potatoes: cutting them in small pieces, massaging them with olive oil, salt, pepper, thyme and paprika. Side B is slightly more abstract. It explores various sounds of energy used to cook the potatoes, the potatoes’ crackling sounds as they come out of the oven and sounds of the garden in an early evening, in October, when the potato season is finished.
Matilde Meireles is a recordist, sound artist, and researcher who makes use of field recordings to compose site-oriented projects. Her projects often have a multi-sensorial approach to ‘site’ which draws from her studies and experience in areas such as field-recording, site-specific visual arts and design.
Matilde often highlights collaboration and participation as catalysts for a shared understanding of place, developing project-based or long-term collaborations. She holds a PhD in Sonic Arts from the Sonic Arts Research Centre, Queen’s University Belfast, and is currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at University of Oxford in the project Sonorous Cities: Towards a Sonic Urbanism (SONCITIES).
