8/6/2011
Gone with the Wind
Raven Row, London
Three pioneers of sound art, Max Eastley, Takehisa Kosugi and Walter Marchetti. Each artist has developed a distinct approach to the problem of representing immateriality, while sharing a lightness of touch, approaching sound with patience, restraint and fidelity. The exhibition comprises historic work, live performance, and a selection of material from the artists' substantial archives. Resonance104.4fm will be installed, broadcasting, and hosting workshops and live events, and a sound installation with contributions solicited from local and international sound artists.
curated by Ed Baxter, director of Resonance104.4fm
This exhibition brings together three pioneers of sound art, Max Eastley (born 1944, UK), Takehisa Kosugi (born 1938, Japan) and Walter Marchetti (born 1931, Italy). Each artist has developed a distinct approach to the problem of representing immateriality, while sharing a lightness of touch, approaching sound with patience, restraint and fidelity. As well as presenting new and historic work, the exhibition will comprise live performance, and a selection of material from the artists' substantial archives.
Max Eastley is an artist and musician whose sound sculptures play on a balance between the natural environment and human intervention. His musical collaborations include the 1975 album New And Rediscovered Musical Instruments with David Toop, produced by Brian Eno. His response to the interior of Raven Row will be a meditation on the 18th century Picturesque, achieved with 21st century technology and a ‘Bergsonian’ approach to time.
Takehisa Kosugi is a major figure in modernist sound art. In the early 1960s his event pieces were realised by Fluxus in Europe and the USA. Kosugi pioneered the development of Japanese experimental music with Group ONGAKU and the Taj Mahal Travellers. Since 1977 he has been a composer/performer at Merce Cunningham Dance Company, and became its Music Director in 1995. As well as archival material, Kosugi will present a number of works including the sound installation Mano-Dharma, electronic, 1967/2011.
Walter Marchetti was a founder member of ZAJ, a recalcitrant Mediterranean parallel to Fluxus, which in the 1960s produced action-music-performances, anarchic gags, and elegant assaults on the music establishment. Marchetti befriended John Cage in 1958, and went on to collaborate with him on a number of projects. His work has often focused on the grand piano – for more than 50 years he has been preparing them like a chef intent on marinating sound. Two of Marchetti's pianos, alongside works from Emanuele Carcano's collection, will be exhibited.
Alongside these positions, Resonance104.4fm will be installed at Raven Row for the duration of the exhibition, broadcasting, and hosting workshops and live events, as well as presenting an ‘overhung’ sound installation – the ‘Resonance Open’ – with contributions solicited from local and international sound artists.
Image: Walter Marchetti, Musica da camera n. 182 Milano, Pianofortissimo, Fondazione Mudima, January 1990. Photo by Fabrizio Garghetti
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