ACUSTICA International SF2000 It's Sound, It's Art, It's Music http://arsacustica.net A two week celebration of SOUND ART brings the boldest, most exciting artists from Europe and the US to galleries, theaters, and museums throughout the city. Acoustic art is the melting pot of heterogeneous elements, noise, language, and music organized by means of electronic techniques into a new, unique genre. It has been developed in experimental studios, like the Studio of Acoustic Art of the WDR (West-German broadcasting station) in Cologne. The focus of ACUSTICA INTERNATIONAL SF 2000 will be on international composers who recorded and composed for this studio under the direction of Klaus Schoening. Refusalon 20 Hawthorne St. September 7 through 30 BILL FONTANA Reception with the artist: Sept. 7, 6-7pm Gallery hours: Tue-Sat 10am-6pm Tel. 415.546-0158 Internationally known for his experimental work in sound, Bill Fontana shares with the small group of artists who work in the medium an interest in transforming the aural environment. He is unique, however, in employing exclusively ambient, rather than electronic, sound. Fontana regards the physical environment as a living source of musical information, with aesthetic and evocative qualities that can conjure up visual imagery. For this show he will install invisible sound pieces with visual surprises. SFMOMA-Phyllis Wattis Theater September 11-24 JUKEBOX Sound Journey into the Studio Akustische Kunst, WDR Curated by Klaus Schoening Admission with museum ticket Tel. 415.357-4000 At SFMOMA, a daily changing non-stop program of superb WDR productions introduces the ACUSTICA events. Among the works to be presented are several joint productions of the Studio of Acoustic Art with American artists and producers, many from the Bay Area. A juke box, especially installed for this event, will play sound compositions, multilingual collages, and sound/voice landscapes by artists such as John Cage, Mauricio Kagel, Pierre Henry, Bill Fontana, Pauline Olivero, Susan Stone, George Brecht, Randy Thom, Tom Marioni, Alvin Curran, Michael Riessler, Charles Amirkhanian, Anthony Moore, and others. New Langton Arts at 8pm 1246 Folsom Street Friday, September 22 GERHARD STAEBLER & KUNSU SHIM Futuressencexxx Admission: $10 general, $8 members/students/seniors Tel. 415.626-5416 No other school of art has inspired people's creativity as vigorously as Futurism, which began in the early 20th century and still gives fresh impetus to various art forms. Futuressencexxx focuses on provocative plays from the futurist movement. The original works, read by local artists from a contemporary point of view, are dramatized through musical compositions by German artists Gerhard Staebler and Kunsu Shim. The music, which for the most part has been created at the ZKM, Center for Art and Media Technology in Karlsruhe, Germany, invites us to hear, see, touch, smell, and pulls us into the whirlpool of ACUSTICA INTERNATIONAL 2000. Hawthorne Lane Bar 22 Hawthorne St. Saturday, September 23 at 2pm TOM MARIONI & JOHN CAGE Admission free JOHN CAGE 4'33" (for piano), 1952 TOM MARIONI Beer Drinking Sonata (with percussion) 1996-00 For Thirteen Players First performed in 1997 without percussion with the Art Orchestra at the Palace of the Legion of Honor in San Francisco, the Beer Drinking Sonata with percussion will have its world premiere. Tom Marioni conducts the three movements - Allegro, Adagio, Rondo - of the sonata which features full beer bottles and thirteen performers who empty them throughout the performance. Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Theater Saturday, September 23 7:30pm - 10:30pm INTERMEDIA PROGRAM with Multichannel Performances Admission: $20 general / $15 members/students/seniors; two-day ticket (9/23 & 9/24 at Dolby) $30 / $20 Reception with the artists at 6pm, tickets: $40 / $35, two-day ticket plus reception $45 / $40; for tickets call 415.978-ARTS NICOLA SANI Water Memories Loudspeaker concert live with Roberto Fabbriciani: contrabass flute Nicola Sani: electronics Tape production: WDR Studio Akustische Kunst, 1996, 35 min Centered on the theme of flowing water, the acoustic material for this composition consists of natural and electronic instrumental sounds reminiscent of the qualities and sounds of water. The live performance, realized by Nicola Sani, features Italian virtuoso for contrabass flute Roberto Fabbriciani, moving in an acoustic environment of the sound of flowing water. MICHAEL RIESSLER Fever Shakespeare Sonetts in Voice, Dance and Music Live with Nigel Charnock: dance, voice Michael Riessler: saxophone, clarinet Tape production: WDR Studio Akustische Kunst, 1999 40 min This complex electro-acoustic composition in the form of a string quartet transports us into the Elizabethan age. English dancer, actor, writer, and choreographer Nigel Charnock interprets Shakespeare sonetts in permanent movement. With clarinet and saxophone, Michael Riessler enters into a dialogue with the dancer. Fever makes dance audible and conveys danced poetry to the ear. INTERMISSION ALVIN CURRAN Erat Verbum John Dedicated to John Cage Electro-acoustic live concert with Alvin Curran: keyboard Production: WDR Studio Akustische Kunst 2000, 15 min This etude and portrait of John Cage uses the sounds of his voice, music, and personal environment in a performance of raw and digitally processed sounds created directly from a sampler and controller keyboard. A second computer program distributes the performed structures through an eight channel sound system. JOHN CAGE Roaratorio. An Irish Circus on Finnegans Wake Multichannel performance Voice: John Cage, Singer: Joe Heaney, Fiddle: Paddy Glackin, Bodrhan: Peada and Mel Mercier, Flute: Matt Malloy, Uillean pipes: Seamus Ennis Realisation: John Cage and John David Fullemann, Executive producer: Klaus Schning. Multichannel production: WDR Studio Akustische Kunst/The Cage Trust, 1979, 60 min Karl-Sczuka Prize 1979 With his prize-winning piece, Roaratorio, an Irish Circus on Finnegans Wake, John Cage composed a key work in the acoustic art of the 20th century. Drawing on his experience of music, verse, sound poetry, recording montage, and his close ties to Zen Buddhism, he created an all encompassing cosmogony of the human voice, the sounds of nature, and the human environment. His enduring and intensive preoccupation with James Joyce's Finnegans Wake led to this sound-text of 2500 sounds and quotes from Finnegans Wake, spoken by John Cage. Dolby Laboratories Sunday, September 24, 11am - 5pm AUDIO-VISION PROGRAM with Panel Discussion Admission: $20 general / $15 members/students/seniors Advanced tickets only (box lunch incl.) call 415.978-ARTS RANDY THOM Ear Circus Number One Compositon with soundtrack motives >From the film Forrest Gump Production: WDR Studio Akustische Kunst 1995, presented by Randy Thom, 60 min followed by a demonstration of his film soundtracks "Ear Circus Number One does not have a 'story' in the sense that a Hollywood film has a story, but it has some of the dynamics of a story. Many of the sounds suggest certain kinds of locales, and a few of the sounds are being filtered through the point of view of a character who is possibly going in and out of a dream, or a series of memories, most of them unpleasant, some about war. I used some of the sounds that I recorded for the film Forrest Gump, including the helicopter." -Randy Thom NICOLA SANI / MICHELANGELO ANTONIONI Noto-Mandorli-Vulcano-Stromboli-Carnevale Film by Michelangelo Antonioni Music and soundtrack by Nicola Sani Presented by Nicola Sani 20 min Nicola Sani presents the musical soundtrack to Antonioni's short poetic film, images of the sites where he shot his masterwork L'Avventura thirty years ago. Sani's composition consists of concrete instrumental and electro-acoustic sound material merging sound and image. ROBERT CAHEN Sept visions fugitives / Seven Fleeting Visions (excerpts) Camera and realisation: Robert Cahen, acoustic design: Michel Chion, sound editing and mixing: Pierre Emanuel Poizat Production: ARTE and Les Films du Tambour de Soie in collaboration with CICV Presented by Robert Cahen Grand Prix Europe, International Video Festival Estavar, Spain 1995, International Video Art Prize, Germany, 1996 Robert Cahen presents sequences of his prize-winning and already legendary videofilm, Seven Fleeting Visions, which trace the idea of concentrated meaning within a concentrated aesthetics perhaps reflecting a secret affinity to the creative process in haiku poetry. Cahen's videos display not only his own inner world, but also the inner and outer world of an alien with his gestures and rituals. INTERMISSION BILL FONTANA Acoustical Visions of Venice (excerpts) North American Premiere DVD production: WDR Studio Akustische Kunst, 2000 Presented by Bill Fontana 30 min Acoustical Visions of Venice is one of three unique projects based on a large collection of multichannel digital recordings Bill Fontana made during his installation for the Venice Biennale in 1999. The installation placed on the facade of the Punta della Dogana, the famous 15th century customs house, explores the idea of hearing as far as you can see with microphones and transmitters placed in the amazing visual panorama of Venice that surrounds the Dogana. The idea is to explore the changing space of sonic perception in the layered sound textures of Venice. ANTHONY MOORE Moving Sounds (excerpts) DVD production: WDR Studio Akustische Kunst, 2000 Presented by Anthony Moore 30 min Exploring acoustic space with DVD technology, Moving Sounds tries to map the space of the studio by mechanical means as a volumetric area through which sounding objects swim. Quietness means distance, loud sounds reflect closeness, movements to the left or right are actual in a network of travelling receivers (microphones) and mobile sources. The results of these experiments are then composed to form a piece about space and shifting sonic perspectives. PIERRE HENRY / WALTHER RUTTMANN La Ville / Die Stadt. Metropolis Paris - Berlin HoerSpielFilm with the silent movie Berlin. Die Sinfonie der Gro§stadt (1927) by Walther Ruttmann Production: WDR Studio Akustische Kunst, 1985 Presented by Klaus Schoening 65 min Klaus Schoening presents this audiovisual project which combines Pierre Henry's sound composition, La Ville/Die Stadt/The City, Metropolis Paris-Berlin with the silent movie, Berlin. Sinfonie einer Grossstadt, by the German filmpioneer Walther Ruttmann. The composition structured by numerous acoustic micro-components like a film without pictures is an homage to Ruttmann's classical silent film, a unique artistic document about Berlin and the roaring twenties. PANEL DISCUSSION with the Artists Moderator: Klaus Schoening San Francisco Art Institute Lecture Hall Sunday, September 24 at 8pm SOUNDS OF ALL KINDS >From DADA to NOW Admission $10 general, $8 members/students/seniors Tel. 415.771-7020 TRISTAN TZARA / RICHARD HUELSENBECK / MARCEL JANKO L'amiral cherche une maison a louer (1916) for three performers In 1916, artists Tristan Tzara, Marcel Janko, and Richard Huelsenbeck collaborated on "simultaneous poems," of which "The Admiral looks for a house to rent" is a daring and amusing example. Three performers speak three languages (French, German, English) while simultaneously making noises to create a true Dada experience. WASSILY KANDINSKY Klaenge / Sounds (1912) Poetic texts read in German and English Around 1912, painter Wassily Kandinsky experimented with texts he called Klaenge, which deal both directly and indirectly with sounds of all kinds. They will be presented here in their original German with English translations, all accompanied by slides of woodcuts he created for the first published edition of the poems. KURT SCHWITTERS Ursonate (1922-32) Excerpts performed by Konrad Steiner and Charles Boone Kandinsky's Klaenge and Schwitters sound works and collages from a few years later are pioneering experiments in what we call nowadays crossover art: art in genres not normally associated with the artists who created it. CHARLES AMIRKHANIAN Son of Metropolis San Francisco (1997) Tape composition Composer Charles Amirkhanian will be on hand for the first Bay Area performance of Son of Metropolis San Francisco. This tape composition is a highly subjective sound portrait of our city, which avoids the more obvious tourist's view of this place. ABIGAIL CHILD Mercy (1989) Sound film The films of Abigail Child, one of America's foremost experimenters in the medium, invariably feature sonic elements which are as powerful and provocative as their visual elements. LAETITIA SONAMI Conversation with a Lightbulb (2000) Live computer sound performance with visual elements/faculty installation World renowned composer/performer Laetitia Sonami is a pioneer in live computer performance. In concert, she wears a specially designed glove that is hooked directly into her computer. Through this, the movements of her fingers, wrist, and arm act as triggers for the vast array of sounds that emerge from loudspeakers; her movements during the performance provide a kind of choreographed visual element to the sounds. The program, co-sponsored by the San Francisco Cinematheque, is organized and directed by San Francisco Art Institute faculty member Charles Boone ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------- JOIN THE GOETHE-INSTITUT - Become a Member! You are invited to become a friend and benefactor of the Goethe-Institut, San Francisco. If you are interested in German culture, or have enjoyed our programs, language classes, and library services in the past, we hope you will consider becoming a member so that we can continue to offer you the benefits you have come to value. 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