Digital #MediaArt(s) Numérique(s)

The structure of language – musical at its origin – is the source of this installation. Based on texts and melodies originating from operas telling the Faust myth (the epic of human curiosity and desire), the installation explores the underlying contour of language.

The work is made of industrial objects. 102 screens and speakers creating an emergent space, arranged in repetitive patterns. Blowing up the virtual into space. Phrases and melodies of the vocalists are constantly reproduced using machine learning software. Powerful algorithms, which transform the way we act and think, omnipresent in our society and in permanent interaction with us. A new version of Faust is created, fragmented and with varying degrees of legibility, recreated in light and sound movements. 

It is a game with the boundaries of perception. The point where language loses its meaning and becomes abstract. Language which is pushed to its limits, where nothing is left but pure rhythmic and melodic structure. It is the organic nature of language, imitated by a machine. This reveals the proper poetics – in all its absurdity – of the digital.

A production of Le Fresnoy - Studio national des arts contemporains
lefresnoy.net
Supported by Bipolar in the framework of RUNAWAY
bipolar-production.com

Engineer: Glenn Silver
Camera: Aurelie Brouet

L’installation se base sur des textes et mélodies d’opéra inspirés par le mythe de Faust – l’épopée de la curiosité humaine et de ses limites. 102 écrans et haut-parleurs sont disposés afin de créer des schémas répétitifs, projetant le virtuel dans l’espace. Les phrases et mélodies des chanteurs sont reproduites à l’aide de logiciels d’apprentissage automatique. Une nouvelle version de Faust est créée, en mouvements fragmentés de sons et de lumières. C’est un jeu avec les frontières de la perception. L’instant où le langage perd son sens, devient abstrait et révèle ainsi la véritable poétique (dans toute son absurdité) du numérique.

The installation is based on texts and melodies collected from operas narrating the Faust myth – the epic of human curiosity and its limits. 102 screens and speakers are arranged in repetitive patterns creating an emergent space. The phrases and melodies of the vocalist are reproduced using machine learning software. A new version of Faust is created in fragmented movements of light and sound. It is a game with the boundaries of perception. The point where language loses its meaning and becomes abstract. This reveals the proper poetics – in all its absurdity – of the digital.

The structure of language and its musical origins provide the starting point for this installation playing with the borders of perception. With the aid of algorithms and learning software, opera lyrics and melodies inspired by the legend of Faust – the ultimate story of human curiosity and its limits – are reproduced in the space as light and sound by 102 screens and as many louds- peakers. Pushed to its limits, retaining only a purely rhythmic and melodic structure, language becomes abstract. Its organic nature, imitated by a machine, is what reveals the true poetry of digital technology.

Read more : http://www.prixcube.com/en/folio/lukas-truniger

A lire également : http://lefresnoy.net/panorama17/artwork/558/deja-entendu-an-opera-automaton/lukas-truniger#artwork

Distribution & Festivals
http://bipolar-production.com/deja-entendu-i-an-opera-automaton

Anders Hoff is a generative artist and programmer. Most of his time is spent exploring the interesting results you can get from simple rules.

Harold Cohen, an abstract painter who developed Aaron, one of the first and eventually one of the most complex computer software programs for generating works of art, died on April 27 at his home in Encinitas, Calif. He was 87.

The cause was congestive heart failure, his son, Paul, said.

Mr. Cohen was a painter growing weary with the traditional practice of art in the late 1960s when he taught himself, out of curiosity, how to program a computer. ...

Through this series of generative paintings, we explore the raw material that are the contemporary pornographic videos. Each slaughter develops an aspect in touch with these productions: the pleasure, the sensualism, the disappearance of the individual, the violence, the suffering, etc.

The rare understandable tracks suggest rather that they show the sexual intercourse, bringing a painterly sensuality in generated images.

project page: frankiezafe.org/index.php?id=245
Soundtrack by Gauthier Keyarts: gauthierkeyaerts.wordpress.com/
made with openframeworks