Sound and Cardboard

Working with motors, string, paper and cardboard Swiss artist Zimoun makes amazing installations that dramatically change spaces both sonically and visually.

www.zimoun.net

317 prepared dc-motors, paper bags, shipping container Zimoun 2016 Motors, wood, paper, metal, cotton, power supplies. Dimensions: 6m x 2.4m x 3.5m. Installation view: Art Basel, Switzerland. Commissioned by Sennheiser. Presented by Sennheiser and Dampfzentrale Bern. Project management by Florian Bürki and Ulf Kallscheidt. Studio production assisted by Benedetta Caliari, Lugh O'Neil, Matteo Taramelli and Florian Buerki. _ More works & information: https://www.zimoun.net Current & upcoming Exhibitions: https://www.zimoun.net/events.html Get the Newsletter: https://www.zimoun.net/newsletter.html Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/studiozimoun Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/zimoun HD Video Archive: https://www.vimeo.com/zimoun/videos/sort:plays

157 prepared dc-motors, cotton balls, cardboard boxes 60x20x20cm Zimoun 2014 Motors, cardboard, wood, metal, cotton, power supply. Dimensions: 12m x 4m x 4m / 39 x 13 x 13 ft.. Studio production by Matteo Taramelli, assisted by Janis Weidner, Elisa Tangheroni, Ulf Kallscheidt, Florian Bürki, Till Hillbrecht, Teddy Laure & Benoît Villemont. Video & photography © Studio Zimoun. _ More works & information: https://www.zimoun.net Current & upcoming Exhibitions: https://www.zimoun.net/events.html Get the Newsletter: https://www.zimoun.net/newsletter.html Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/studiozimoun Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/zimoun HD Video Archive: https://www.vimeo.com/zimoun/videos/sort:plays

Zimoun : A Selection of Works 2005-2019 Compilation Video V.3.9 / Updated: March 2020 HD 1920 x 1080 px _ More works & information: https://www.zimoun.net Current & upcoming Exhibitions: https://www.zimoun.net/exhibitions/ Get the Newsletter: https://www.zimoun.net Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/studiozimoun HD Video Archive: https://www.vimeo.com/zimoun/videos/sort:plays _ «Zimoun is best known for his installative, generally site-specific, immersive works. He employs kinetic principles of rotation and oscillation to put things into motion and thus produce sounds. For this he principally uses simple materials from everyday life and industrial usage, such as cardboard, DC motors, cables, welding wire, wooden spars or ventilators. For his works Zimoun develops small apparatuses which, despite their fundamental simplicity, generate a tonal and visual complexity once activated – particularly when a large number of such mechanical contraptions, generally hundreds of them, are united and orchestrated in installations and sculptures. One example of this is the work 255 prepared ac-motors, 325 kg roof laths, 1.8 km rope (2015): 250 roof spars hanging from fine cords fall, at timed intervals, the approximately 20 centimetres to the ground, repeatedly. Thanks to the wood’s elasticity, the spars bounce like rubber balls on the hard concrete floor and produce an audible, multiple echo. Zimoun creates a three-dimensional sonic space the visitor can actively explore. Zimoun’s works continually embrace oppositional positions, such as the principles of order and chaos. Works may be arranged in a geometrical pattern or ordered and installed according to a system, yet they behave chaotically and act – within a carefully prepared framework of possibilities – in an uncontrolled manner as soon as they are mechanically activated. As if in a clinical study, the pattern and the systematic approach enable an overview, so that the chaos generated by the mechanical process can be better analysed. Mass and individuality also belong among these oppositional positions. The artist often employs a large number of identical elements, but each element develops its own individuality and unique nature through the dynamic interplay of mechanism, rotation and material. The mechanical elements, prepared by hand in the studio, which have a consistently reduced, minimalistic form, function and aesthetic, possess only apparent precision, because the manual production creates divergence from the ideal treatment of the material, allowing imprecisions that emphasise the emerging individual behaviour of the materials, enable it or indeed provoke it. When naming his works Zimoun consistently follows the principle of listing the materials used one after another. With this he brings materials to the fore; in addition, the titles signal the ‘prepared’ mechanism, indicating the connection to intentionally tonally manipulated musical instruments. His works are often defined using the term of sound architectures, based on the principles of Minimal Music, to which he brings a visual aspect while insisting on a simple, reduced design without embellishment or additional colour. Although Zimoun conceives of his installations as compositions in a musical sense, he does not actively intervene in the development of their sound. He does not direct the mechanical systems implemented either in an analogue manner or digitally, via a microcontroller or a computer, instead merely activating them by turning on or off their electricity supply. He sees the moment of activation and the dynamic of the materials themselves as a sculptural and performative approach and names the principle behind these works ‘primitive complexity’. In addition to his installative compositions, Zimoun also develops purely acoustic works. Although the two genres – visual, un-controlled, accidental compositions and musical compositions for sound recording and performance that are laboriously constructed in the studio – may seem quite different at first, both emerge from the artist’s interest in creating spaces and acoustic states which are composed of microscopically small sounds and noises. Zimoun’s recordings are often, like the performative concert arrangements, conceived of for multi-channel sound systems. Through the implementation of multiple loudspeakers, listeners are placed within a three-dimensional sonic architecture which cannot be discovered visually, but only acoustically. Zimoun also works on recordings with other artists from music and the visual arts. Many of these recordings have been released by the Leerraum label, which he founded in 2003 together with graphic designer Marc Beekhuis and which is also available to other artists with reductive concepts.» Text by Ulf Kallscheidt. Translation by Aoife Rosenmeyer. From Sikart Lexicon: http://www.sikart.ch/KuenstlerInnen.aspx?id=11318186 _ Website: http://www.zimoun.n

Playtronica - Touch interfaces and performance

The Russian / French company Playtronica is definitely the most prolific creators of touch-based musical installations. They currently have two devices that they sell that allow anyone to create the kind of work that they put into public spaces (or perform in concert settings).

This blog post will grow over time as I develop a greater understanding of their work and look at examples of their performances and novel uses of their devices (Touch Me and Playtron).

Playtronica at the Pompidou

Playtronica created this performance piece in collaboration with Arte Radio at the Centre Pompidou. It is a re-imagining of György Ligeti’s music and inspired by the Endless Column sculpture b y Constantin Brâncuși in the background.

The passers-by had to, step onto Playtronica-wired floor, and touch the skin of the “columns”. Thus, by spontaneous interaction of strangers, a new interpretation of a famous masterpiece was born.

ART Installation during the Soirée Sonore #4 of Centre Pompidou in collaboration with Arte Radio. A piece based on Ligeti music and Brancusi "Endless Column"...

‘Inclusive’ testing of their installation at the Pompidou

The album that made me delete all my News apps

Last week was a rough week, I was coping pretty well in this mess of a year up until last week.

Febm - Tape 3

Like many folks here in Melbourne I think the lockdown is getting to me a bit more than I had been letting on. Not seeing family and friends, never really breathing fresh air (we have no outside space and are masked every time we leave the house). And to top it all off I am very closely watching the shipwreck that is unfolding in the United States. I know my interest is outsized, I lived there for a couple of years and still have close friends in Lincoln, Nebraska but really if I follow any news I should be following what’s happening in my own backyard!

I don’t think it is actually the news that I am following, I have no agency, I have no control over what happens in American politics. The reason I follow it is for the show, the drama, the twists and turns. Every day is a new episode of an Orson Welles radio drama (is this real? Surely this isnt real!).

So I say farewell (for now) to the supreme court, the tax returns, the protests and the gun-toting white supremicists. I’m turning off, apps are deleted…

Oh and what was the Album that got me thinking about this? It is the new Album from Netherlandian Felbm. His last two albums (Tape 1 & Tape 2) were fantastic mellow almost ‘elevator lounge’ but somehow not in a daggy way. This new tape (Tape 3) adds real drums and a much bigger sound, there is some real soul in this album but with the same Felbm tone and weirdness.

There is nothing about this album that directly made me want to stop listening to American political news (so no guarantee it will work for you!). I think it is simply that there are no words that can ever be a substitute for good music, so I’ll stop.

-Glen

Interview on State of the Art - PBS

I had the great pleasure to chat to Annika on State of the Art about Playable Streets’ new online platform ‘Playable Web’. We discuss moving from interaction online onto the internet. How does a company that is so focussed on real and tangible touch interactions create work that is still collaborative in spirit?

You can listen to the interview here and go to the PBS website to listen and support their great work!

Support PBS & keep it loud and local

Playable Streets · PBS Radio Interview discussing Playable Web SEPT 9 2020