The two audiovisual performances of this program address the materiality of moving images. The title of the evening is a reference to William Gibson's book of the same name, which is an examination of the human desire to detect patterns or meaning in what might appear to be meaningless data. Both performances are deep explorations of the forms which emerge when materials and data are analysed and made visible in unexpected ways. The evening can be seen as an extension of the themes explored in the transmediale.10 exhibition, 'Future Obscura', which presents artistic work that uses the materials, mechanisms and machines of image-making to illuminate and define our relationship with atemporality – the collision of past, present and future. At the same time the transdisciplinary and synaesthetic nature of the performances – combining sound, programming, computer graphics and film – refer to CTM.10's theme, 'Overlap'.
The concert is part of this year's series of concerts and performances, jointly programmed by transmediale and CTM > read more.
Thomas Köner & Jürgen Reble [DE] "Materia Obscura"
Our universe consists mostly of dark and imperceptible matter. This performance is a door to enter this world. The visual source material for 'Materia Obscura are approximately 25.000 scans in high resolution of 16mm 'chemograms' that filmmaker Jürgen Reble produced in the past. These 'chemograms' are made by unique alchemical transformations of the film material itself. The editing of the image streams will happen live on the computer. It is a visual expedition into crystallized salts and dyes which are changing rhythm and structure constantly between moving images, reveilling the bizarre richness and beauty of its materiality. In his music, Thomas Köner always moved towards the borders of perception, as if it was a means of communication with the beyond. The quadrophonic staging of 'Materia Obscura expands the performance space, where the horizontal flow of time meets with the sonic impulse and creates a vertical dimension, in which premonition, memory and splinters of Here and Now become perceptible as the darkening of the observed Materia.
Ryoiji Ikeda [JP] "test pattern [live set]"
'test pattern', the latest audiovisual work in the 'datamatics' series of Japan's leading electronic composer/artist, Ryoji Ikeda, presents intense flickering black and white imagery, which floats and convulses in darkness to a powerful, highly synchronised soundtrack. Through a real-time computer program, Ikeda converts the audio signals into tightly synchronised barcode patterns on screen. The velocity of the moving images is ultra-fast, some hundreds of frames per second, so that the work provides a performance test for the audio and visual devices, as well as a response test for the audience's perceptions.
Produced by Forma.
