Hi Johannes,
Thanks, glad you enjoyed the work.
The composer and I followed a fairly systematic plan of collaboration.
Before we began work, we determined a number of forms and processes that
could work in both visual and musical domains. We also considered that
decisions about coordinating music and image would fall on a spectrum from
independent (forms juxtaposed but with no common features or timing),
intersected (some features shared, others free to vary), to complementary
(fairly strict correspondence of a select number of properties in the music
and the animation). Most of the time there are intersecting processes
occurring, but rarely producing coincidental events. A rhythm in the music
might be generated by exactly the same algorithm as patterns in space.
Sometimes we had the same frequency of signal producing patterns as
producing sound. Other times, I had rhythmic visual events that I knew to
be generated by the same process as the musical events, but with somewhat
different parameters, so that events would both coincide and diverge. At
other times, the musical and visual events might be related more by
metaphor than by structure -- the density of events might run parallel, or
might diverge, with the visuals nearly empty while the music rushes on.
Generally, the compositional techniques are not meant to be noticed. They
are the scaffolding of our decisions, that we take away to reveal the work.
Because the architectural space is an office building and because we had to
run the animation and music as a loop, there was just ambient electronic
music to accompany the animation on site. The ending was rather muted, even
for the performances with the musicians (we were fortunate to have two
performances and a studio recording). To make it more emphatic, I used
large colorful shapes at the end, considering the final arrival at a
symmetrical array as a sort of cadence. In a sense, the final animation is
loud while the music is quiet, or the loudness of the cadence is given to
the animation while the harmonic progression is given to the music.
Will try to answer questions in your second paragraph tomorrow.
best,
Paul
On Fri, Aug 25, 2023 at 9:21 AM Johannes Birringer via NetBehaviour <
netbehaviour@lists.netbehaviour.org> wrote:
> fascinating beautiful work, very inspiring, Paul!
>
> thanks also for giving a bit of insight (website documentation) into your
> visual process and the concept for having such visual/music, such animations
> and the evolving [interactive] patterning (background and foreground). I
> was mesmerized yet also began to question or wanting to interrogate the
> evolving pattern (did you and the composer develop this together or is the
> music irrespective of the visuals (though you mention your Rondo form)? - I
> guess I ask whether the music can respond to an immersive environment
> /projection as you seem to have created it in this amazing glass house
> (the lobby of 150 Riverside Plaza in Chicago?), or rather is it
> fixed/controlled/composed? why so?
> You mention an architectural-video-installation, thus could you please
> expand a little, since i am interested in the historical side of your work
> too, when did visual music (did Eno call it that) or projected visual
> scenographies become coupled with architecture (Xenakis?), how did digital
> software artists develop this further or not? and why did you decide on
> what, to me (on the vimeo concert), looks a 'flat canvas', perhaps (if an
> art reference is permitted) a Mondrianic kind of Agnes Martin painting
> field becoming dynamic, motional? (I say this as an admirer of Martin's
> paintings and her book "Paintings, Writings, Remembrances). Or did you
> perhaps see the massive 3D immersive spectacles (teamLab stuff, and other
> current projection environments) as a trap? How did the glass architecture
> change your visuals (was 150 Media Stream concert different from what you
> posted now?).
>
> with regards
> Johannes Birringer
>
> On Fri, Aug 25, 2023 at 6:29 AM Paul Hertz via NetBehaviour <
> netbehaviour@lists.netbehaviour.org> wrote:
>
>> I am very pleased to announce the release a video for my recent
>> collaborative project Campos | Temporales. Campos is an "intermedia
>> experience" where algorithmic animation and new music share formal
>> structures in time and space to create a hybrid art form. Composer
>> Christopher Walczak wrote the music, which was recorded at Experimental
>> Sound Studio in Chicago. The work originated as a large scale video
>> installation in a curated space in Chicago, 150 Media Stream.
>>
>> The video can be viewed on Vimeo:
>> https://vimeo.com/856300250
>> There's documentation on my website, soon to be updated:
>> https://paulhertz.net/projects/Campos%20%7C%20Temporales
>>
>> Duration: 15:27
>>
>> In addition to this streaming version, we have a UHD version with concert
>> quality audio.
>>
>> saludos,
>>
>> Paul
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> -
