Three Theories is an intense dance piece that is full of energy. It was influenced by physicist, Brian Greene’s book, The Elegant Universe and three theories – General Theory of Relativity, Quantum Mechanics and String Theory – that are discussed in the book. Karen Armitage choreographs rapidly changing movements that are forceful, sensuous and physical to represent the concepts of the theories. Armitage describes the work as, “a balletic work” and goes on to say:

“There are forces that move us which we understand; others which we don’t. My dances are the combination of both. The ultimate purpose in bringing together such forces is to create beautiful and symbolically meaningful movement that quickens our sense of the world.”

Below are three video excerpts from performances of Three Theories:

Armitage Gone! Dance are based in the US, predominantly performing in New York, but have toured across Europe including venues in Germany, Italy, Belgium and the UK.

If you would like to find out more about Armitage Gone! Dance, you can visit their website at: www.armitagegonedance.org

To see more videos of Armitage Gone! Dance in action, visit their YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/user/ArmitageGoneDance

The British Art Show is a touring art exhibition that runs for a whole year every five years. BAS describes itself as being, “widely recognized as the most ambitious and influential exhibition of contemporary British art“. The British Art Show 7 – In the days of the comet, is currently in Glasgow where it will stay until 21st August. It will then move to Plymouth, it’s final destination, until 4th December. Previous venues for BAS7 have been Nottingham and London.

NUD (3)2009 by Sarah Lucas

39 artists have been chosen by curators Lisa Le Feuvre and Tom Morton on the basis of these artists’ contribution to contemporary art over the past five years. The theme of the exhibition is the comet and the ways in which the comet has been interpreted and given meaning by human cultures.

'Our House' (The Object) by Nathaniel Mellors

Of the exhibition theme, the curators write:

“While current scientific theory posits that comets are nothing more than elliptically orbiting clumps of dust, ice and gas, utterly indifferent to our affairs, they remain powerful reminders of the way in which our species has attempted to understand experience through the measuring of time, the writing of history, the belief in cosmological influence, and the notion of a deterministic universe.”

Untitled (2005-2010) by Roger Hiorns

Here is a short video from the British Art Show website, presented by the curators, which gives a feel for the exhibition:

If you would like to find out more about the exhibition, please visit: www.britishartshow.co.uk

To see more work by the artists from the exhibition featured here, please visit:

Sarah Lucas:
www.gladstonegallery.com/lucas.asp
Sarah Lucas on www.tate.org.uk
www.sadiecoles.com/sarah_lucas/index.html

Nathaniel Mellors:
Mellors on www.ica.org.uk
www.mattsgallery.org/artists/mellors/exhibition-1.php

Roger Hiorns:
Hiorns on www.tate.org.uk – exhibitions
Hiorns on www.tate.org.uk – artists
Hiorns on www.artangel.org.uk

This Thursday the Ether Festival opens at the Southbank Centre. Ether is an annual music festival, “of innovation, art, technology and cross-arts experimentation” (Southbank Centre website).

Iannis Xenakis
This year there is a strong focus on the work of the French composer, Iannis Xenakis. This includes an International conference comprising several talks, workshops and performances of the composer’s work. Xenakis is known for his use of processes and the application of mathematical theories as compositional tools. As well as writing instrumental and vocal music, Xenakis also wrote electronic music and devised a computerised musical composition tool called UPIC which he used for the composition of some of his electronic work. The festival is running a series of workshops on the use of UPIC.

One of Xenakis’ pieces that is to be performed is Rebonds which is for solo percussionist. Here is a taste of what could be expected at the festival concert on 3rd April:

The Fitkin Band
On the opening day of the festival (24th March) there is a performance by the Fitkin Band. This is the British composer Graham Fitkin’s nine-piece band, formed in 2009. They are joined by musicians and dancers from Trinity Laban Conservatoire in creating a site-specific event. Below is an extract from a live performance by the Fitkin Band:

Fitkin Band live in Nottingham from Fitkin Band on Vimeo.

Another event worthy of note is the world premiere of Will Gregory’s (of Goldfrapp fame) opera, Piccard in Space. For more details on this and plenty of other events, visit the Ether programme which is linked below.

Ether runs from 24th March to 28th April at the Southbank Centre. For full details about the festival, visit the Southbank Centre website: www.southbankcentre.co.uk/find/festivals-series/ether

For more information about Iannis Xenakis on this website, visit: Xenakis, Iannis – Info
To see and hear more of Xenakis’ work, visit YouTube and type his name – you’ll get plenty of hits.

For more information about the Fitkin Band on this website, visit: Fitkin Band – Info
To see and hear more of the Fitkin Band, visit: www.vimeo.com/fitkin

Keep Your Hands Off is a multimedia work that combines fine art, animation and sound sculpture. The focus of the piece is a collection of Russian Avant-garde paintings. Images of these paintings and sound recordings with a Russian theme are manipulated to produce a visual & sonic exhibition.

Here’s the video:

Keep Your Hands Off from Sebastiano Dessanay on Vimeo.

Here is a description of the piece by Sebastiano and credits for the video:

This multimedia work has been conceived in order to bring back to life some Russian Avant-garde paintings from last century in form of a virtual exhibition. The slogan “Keep your hands off, bourgeois!”, inscribed on a painting in the collection, inspired the title of this work.
The musical inspiration came directly from contemplation of these paintings. Twelve were chosen from the collection (totalling nearly sixty works) according to my personal taste. The sequence in which the paintings are revealed emphasizes their visual contrast and is further supported by sonic contrast, each painting being assigned different musical sources, in close relation with the aesthetics of the Russian Avant-garde music and visual concepts.

DVD Credits:

Music and visuals by Sebastiano Dessanay

Russian voices: Lenin (political speech, 1919-20), Leon Trotsky (political speech, ca. 1938), Dmitri Shostakovich (radio message broadcast, 1941).
Manipulated short music fragments from: Modest Mussorgsky (Pictures at an Exhibition), Arseny Avraamov (Symphony of Sirens, version by L. Amigo & M. Molina), Yuli Meytuss (Dnieper Water Power Station), Alexander Mossolov (The Steel Foundry), Sergei Prokofiev (Toccata in D minor), Dmitri Shostakovich (Symphony No.2).
Other music samples and noises recorded in Birmingham by the author in April-May 2009.
Also thanks to Leonid Nikishin, Vera Khait and Tatiana Dardykina for their vocal contribution and Zsófia Faragó for her ‘modified’ piano practice.

Original Russian paintings property of Araba Fenice Art Gallery, Cagliari, Italy.

Motion Graphic Design by Pawel Stec.
Cover Notes by Margherita Dessanay.
Cover Design by Stroke.

© 2009 Sebastiano Dessanay

For more information about Sebastiano on this site, please visit Dessanay, Sebastiano – Info

To see and hear more of Sebastiano’s work, please visit his website: www.sebastianodessanay.com

Sandglasses by Justė Janulytė was performed at Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival on the 28th November and it forms our third feature on the festival. We hope you enjoy the video below:

Programme note for Sandglasses (by the composer):

“Sandglasses” explores acoustic, visual and symbolic meanings of a sand timer, as a phenomenon. The inspiration of the piece is a simultaneous launch of several sandglasses of different capacity and duration. This idea is materialized in music by a polytemporal canon played by cellos which pass through their entire register at different rates, thus the initial unison splits off, the voices keep moving further from each other and reach the lowest note at different moments. The sounds produced live are being recorded and repeated in several variants that individually slow down and therefore descend, so that every cello’s sound generates its own polytemporal canon. They keep multiplying and layering before finally interlacing into a dense micropoliphonic texture which covers, floods and replaces the real sources of sound.

The musical idea is visualized by the purpose-built cylinder screens, made of tulle, where video images and light effects are projected. They extend and transform the performers’ existence on the stage while creating fictions and submerging spectators into various perceptive experiences.

Although the point of departure of the piece was of a purely acoustic-visual nature, the phenomenon of sandglass, being open for diverse interpretations, got wrapped with some implications and associations during the creative process. The metaphoric sand which seeps from the sandglasses, as a sediment of the passing time, accumulates and submerges the imprisoned individuals. Their identities transform, fade and vanish until the glasses fill up and the relentless operation of the chronometers stops. Everything freezes and the reverse process of purification starts.

For further details about the performance at the festival on 28th November, please click here.

For further information about Justė Janulytė on this site, please visit her page: Janulytė, Justė – Info

To see/hear more of Justė Janulytė’s work, please visit: http://www.janulyte.info