I've just come back from a trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan. In my quest to avoid the thronging crowds I headed to the less popular Asian section and was straightaway reminded how much I love calligraphy and especially paintings that combine image and text.
Travelling around I started thinking about the microcosmos - the approaches to combining 'organic' and found materials into spaces - works that were not purely artistic or decorative but that frequently held significant meaning, whether in symbolism or text, I enjoyed the mystery of knowing that many of these articles and artefacts had many more secrets to reveal.
So, while it may turn out to be irrelevant, here are a few images from my trip:
I like the way this extraordinary rock seems to have been deified by placing it within a shrine
This reminded me of Megan's approach - this is the inside of a cardboard box, transformed into a piece of art
Here's another, mountains reflecting on water
I like the image that seems to pull the eye in and its combination with calligraphy at either side
Hard to do justice to this with a pic, I think it's called 'The Book From The Sky' - you are totally surrounded by text as you pass through the room, the overhead drapes are especially beautiful
Ceiling as sacred space
A simple idea (?) this evanescent buddha is completely captivating, it seems a great mixture of medium and message
Again, this seemed like a life-size of something Megan might have done (I may be being naive).
A thangka painting (buddhist religious paintings mostly from Tibet and Nepal) just like their other religious counterparts, they are full of symbolism, mostly intended for teaching
This is a quick response to 'Megan replies to Pete's Reply'.
We are definitely on the same page here. I have been thinking about the practicalities of making the Microcosmos and this all fits neatly together.
Here's what I visualise sonically - and this is just a discussion point: I see it starting with a single sculpture - I really think sonically it might well begin with the wind and a single piece lit. I think from there it spreads out across the space.
I totally agree with the idea that there should be sudden non-linear moments.
I confess the idea of headphones doesn't appeal to me - it's something usually used in museums for the effect you describe, to hold people's attention, but actually the whole sound-world for me is about interactions across the space - it's about the fact that we experience a sound close to us in relation to a sound on the opposite side of the space - good 'orchestration' should mean that it isn't a constant chaos but that the sound moves comprehensibly within the space.
Here is what I think the practical, hardware aspect of the Microcosmos might be in order for us to realise these ideas effectively:
Rather than the independent iPods I had thought of, I would now look at running things from two JoeCo Black boxes - these are basically high end audio players that each play back 16 independent tracks and are highly reliable. This would mean that fully synchronised sound within the Microcosmos would be entirely feasible. More to the point this could then work in tandem with a theatre light-board which will give you very synchronised controllable lighting so, let's say, there's some big moment where the sound world really changes across the entire space and you suddenly want everything to be red - it would be relatively easy to achieve. The sync between light and sound would then be far easier to control and, as will inevitably be needed, alterations would then be easy to handle.
I want to make a brief response on here before I forget things. I haven't read all Megan has posted - there's a lot here and I think if I read to the end and then go back I will lose certain threads.
The interconnection of thoughts here is quite mind-boggling to me. I feel a great excitement of possibilities that bubble up out of these postings.
A temporary member of our Tai Chi group (see earlier posting) is Marcy Westerling - a wonderful lady with a quirky spirit and sense of humour. Marcy has terminal cancer and writes a blog I subscribe to called 'Livingly Dying' - so, many of the things that Megan writes about in 'Dying Into Being' seem very in tune (I don't think Megan knew about Marcy's blog).
Megan quoted something I'm fond of saying: "we attach meaning to events, but events happen in the universe and meaning happens in the human heart" - I remember writing this in an appropriately cramped and overheated attic room in Paris some years back - re-reading it here it feels like the first sentence of a paragraph.
I don't know what that paragraph is but I feel it travels along the lines that; beyond the events we are all connected, at a far more fundamental level, call it energies, call it chakra alignment... I believe there is a natural evolution of consciousness in the universe that transcends life-spans or generations, I believe that - and we're into personal belief here, not science - a part of our awareness transcends the corporeal existence and that that energy is present in all life - perhaps even all matter.
When I wrote about the vocal music coming at the end of the cycle that was my instinct - a feeling that - despite the 'emotional weather' the trials and disturbances of life, there is a more profound energies that unites and unifies us - hence my feeling for the end of the work is, in some ways, as though a layer is peeled back - as though we are able to see the energy that underlies these cycles - or to speculate on some sort of 'alignment'.
The alignment I'm thinking of is the inner alignment, of course, as Megan says earlier - there is a revolution that has to happen internally - this is something that unites almost all seemingly disparate beliefs - the belief that nothing really changes until you change the individual.
I happen to believe that this represents an 'evolution of consciousness' that what is required is a brave step beyond the confines of our stone-age brain, which has evolved to thrive and survive within tribal hierarchies. The way in which we do that is specifically through the existence of the ego, or more accurately through identification with the ego, stepping beyond it is not easy, it is a slippery beast and attaches to all manner of things your country, your football team, your good deeds, etc - this is where the great meditators of the world come in - and where an enormous path of speculation broadens out into a freeway....
Okay, I think we’re really getting somewhere in regards to a
basic shared vision for the Microcosmos. We probably had a very similar feel for what
it could be all along, but it has been an excellent practice for me to have to
sort it all out through the very mindful form of the written word.
I agree with what you say regarding the use of the floor,
walls, and ceiling.For the
Microcosmos to function as a fully experiential or consuming space, I think
every element of the space needs to be at least taken into consideration, if
not utilized.We experience the
“real” world in a totally surrounding way and so should we the
Microcosmos.A rather
art-speak way of saying it is that it is not a series of sculptures with sound
in a space, it is an installation that recreates the space.
In fact, everything you say here is right on, and we should
go with these basics:
This leads me to visual it like this: the experience of the
Microcosmos is of entering a space - the space feels limitless, it is dark and
contains numerous lit objects, multiple sounds emanate from within the space.
It makes it feel as though sounds and objects are not always visible - some
objects are only glimpsed at certain times - some sounds emerge from the
darkness.
I definitely agree that not everything is visible at once.
Perhaps some things endure with a force.Perhaps some things only suggest themselves, like a whisper.Things come, things go. Things, of
course, being sounds, objects, imagery.There is the potential for all kinds of meaning, relationships,
suggestions to be made in how things ebb and flow between each other.This will be a dance; a kind of lila
perhaps.But also a careful and
intentional orchestration.
As we think about this orchestration--time and space and what
changes and how it changes--the ideas of linear and non-linear keep entering my
mind.I believe, for a reason that
is mostly intuitive, that the Microcosmos should have a non-linear force, perhaps
with some linear thread. Perhaps external seasons are the linear thread?Perhaps something else?My feeling is that the Microcosmos is a
study and expression of the nature of things, and within the nature of things
there are some things that are linear—clock time, calendars, moon cycles—and
many things that are not—storms, memories, tree branches, emotions, thoughts,
and so on.Some things march in a
straight line, some things play by the known rules of time and space, and some
don’t.
I also think this idea you expressed is an important
element:
I feel there could be moments in the Microcosmos where we are
invited to consider a single object/location/sound, where everything else fades
for a moment and, let's say for argument's sake, a red light picks out
'Tree-Spoon' and a solitary cello line plays (I imagine other things drop to
the background rather than halt altogether).
When I shared the Microcosmos with my husband, Json, he
listened to the sound for SpoonTree and stared at the object.Afterward he noted that by listening
for an allotted time he ended up spending more time with the object (visual
objects in museums etc hold a notoriously short attention span), and had a
longer, more developed, relationship to it.He
expressed how having this one moment with the one object and the one sound allowed
him to really be with it, and that maybe in the Microcosmos there needed to be
an opportunity for one to escape the whole and be with the one (ie.
headphones).I think you are both
pointing at the same thing—the balance between the one and the whole; having
the opportunity for a singular expression, and the time/space to be with that expression.
So, I have yet to talk about your questions/suggestions
regarding symbolic imagery (uteruses, etc.), chakra colors, or prosaic objects
and their inherent meaning or mystery.
I feel that is a whole separate post unto itself, delving into how as a
visual artist I attempt to make meaning.
I look forward to writing it, but for now, I’m signing off.
A little while
back, Pete wrote a post entitled, Standing Like a Tree, which spoke of a moment
of clarity he had about the emotional seasons of the Microcosmos while in the
Chi Gong posture of standing still like a tree (read his post here). His post helped mark a
position in the map of my thoughts, from which I have been trailing out, making
inroads to connections. Though I sense relationships between this post
I’m writing and the Microcosmos, what I am writing here is more of a
self-indulgent act of utilizing this space to put together ideas I’m interested
in—how they relate directly to the Microcosmos or not is yet to be seen.
“Friends you drank some darkness
and became visible.”
-Poet Tomas Transtromer
Megan Gallant, 2013
All too often we make the
mistake of confusing dark energy with evil, and light energy with good.As if evil lives in the darkness and
good in the light.It is a myth of
associations we have been taught a long time.In believing this, we limit our understanding of the full
human experience and our ability to function as a whole.
Imagine it instead like a tree.
Like we are trees, reaching toward the light, our upper half co-mingling with
the sky, while our bottom half holds us firm in the dark earth.Simultaneously and continuously
reaching both upward and downward, into the light and the darkness.The branches cannot exist without the
nourishment provided by the roots, and without the branches the vital, charged
energy of the roots has no where to go, no purpose.
Self Portrait, Megan Gallant, 2013
When we deny our bodily
self from our spirit self we are a tree divided.We are day without night.
Light and Dark energy exist as a symbiotic pair; the brightness of higher
consciousness in balance with the darker earthliness of having a human body. The
balance of spirit and animal.
Why share this? Because it speaks of the inner and outer Because it speaks of being and non-being Because it speaks of a rhythm I feel in the nature of my own being Because it speaks of a pattern underlying the nature of us all Because I love it....
Ernst Lehrs evaluates Goeth in Man or Matter and speaks of a natural principle he calls that of renunciation:
"In the life of the plant this principle shows itself most conspicuously where the green leaf is heightened into the flower. While progressing from leaf to flower the plant undergoes a decisive ebb in its vitality. Compared with the leaf, the flower is a dying organ. This dying, however, is of a kind we may aptly call a 'dying into being.' Life in its mere vegetative form is here seen withdrawing in order that a higher manifestation of the spirit may take place. The same principle can be seen at work in the insect kingdom when the caterpillar's tremendous vitality passes over into the short lived beauty of the butterfly. In the human being it is responsible for that metamorphosis or organic process which occurs on the path from the metabolic to the nervous system, and which we came to recognize as the precondition for the appearance of consciousness within the organism.
After achieving its masterpiece in the flower, the plant once more goes through a process of withdrawal, this time into the tiny organs of fertilization. After fertilization, the fruit begins to swell: once more the plant produces an organ with a more or less conspicuous spatial extension. This is followed by a final and extreme contraction in the forming of the seed inside the fruit. In the seed the plant gives up all outer appearance to such a degree that nothing seems to remain but a small, insignificant speck of organized matter. Yet this tiny, inconspicuous thing bears in it the power of bringing forth a whole new plant.
Forest Filled, Megan Gallant, 2012
During each expansion, the active principle of the plant presses forth into visible appearance; during each contraction it withdraws from outer embodiment into what we may describe as a more formless pure state of being. We thus find the spiritual principle of the plant engaged in a kind of breathing rhythm, now appearing, now disappearing, now assuming power over matter; now withdrawing from it again."
From the Secret Life of Plants by Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird, pgs. 112-113
A little while back, Pete wrote a post entitled, Standing
Like a Tree, which spoke of a moment of clarity he had about the emotional seasons of the Microcosmos while in the Chi Gong posture of standing still like a tree (read his post here).His post helped
mark a position in the map of my thoughts, from which I have been trailing out,
making inroads to connections.Though I sense relationships between this post I’m writing
and the Microcosmos, what I am writing here is more of a self-indulgent act of
utilizing this space to put together ideas I’m interested in—how they relate
directly to the Microcosmos or not is yet to be seen.
There is a Taoist philosophy of active nothingness—that in
not doing is doing something. It seems in this active nothingness
there is much doing, or rather, the potentiality for all doing. In the stillness of active nothingness
I have found the habits of the wind, felt the voluminous movement of a lake. There is a fulfilling energy and grand
doing found in stillness.
While at Blue Mountain Center, Pete shared with another resident
and me his knowledge of Tai Chi, and each morning we practiced together, most
often on a dock on the lake.This,
along with periods of solitary stillness, greatly helped me connect to the wind
and water I just spoke of.
Later, he shared with us online a video of Master Lam, his
teachers’ teacher, which was entitled (in a very westernized way) Stand Still,
Get Fit.In it’s original form it
is a practice called, Zhan Zhuang—to stand like a tree.In the video they say, “we do nothing when we stand still,
but we gain energy from within, just like a tree….As a tree grows its deep
roots, powerful trunk, and spreading branches appear motionless but the tree is
actually growing from within, slowly and silently.” While Master Lam teaches the proper technique of Zhan Zhung,
said to make one strong and heal illness, he stands in a Chinese courtyard
where 4000 year old trees have been contemplated for centuries.
I recommend the whole 11 minute video, but for a nice
summary of these ideas check out minute 5:00 to 6:00.
When I watched this video and heard them talk of a tree as a
human—seemingly unchanging while activity, growth, and energy happen within—I
was struck by the parallel to another seed of wisdom I had recently absorbed.A major contributor to the civil rights
movement, with the insight of 82 years within him, Vincent Harding (fellow BMC
resident) taught me Revolutionary Patience.
Vincent had said, “Like plants, you cannot always see the
change happening in people.”He
spoke about social movements—marches and strikes—and said that, while they have
their place, and an important necessary one, they are not where real change
occurs.Real change happens inside
the human being, inside the human heart.He said, “the revolution will not be televised,” and for the first time
that statement made sense to me.You cannot put on tv, cannot see the change and perhaps the struggle for
it, that happens in the human heart and mind. But that is where the real
revolution, the real evolution, lies.It calls forth one of my favorite lines of Pete’s, “We attach meaning to
events, but events happen in the universe and meaning happens in the human
heart.”What happens in the world
happens—it is how we translate it in our hearts that matters.It is the inner way we respond to the
world that holds the power, as the inner world creates the outer.As Gandhi said, “be the change you want
to see in the world.” Revolutionary change comes from within, not from without;
from being, not from doing.Or
rather, an inner being forms and feeds an outer doing, like sap moving through
branches nourish and inform a leaf.
Vincent went on to tell us the story of how Thich Nhat Hanh,
the Buddhist monk and peace activist, was coming to give a talk in the 1960s,
and arrived on the West Coast where he encountered student activists yelling, “end
the war now! end the war now! out of Vietnam now!” Thich Nhat Hanh pulled the
student leaders aside, and said that he was thankful for their efforts toward
peace.But that they were part of
a movement that was hundreds of years old, and they needed to have
patience.
Revolutionary patience. A giant oak does not grow from an
acorn to its full height overnight, or even in a season.One must be patient.I realized that this revolutionary
patience applies not only to the evolution of the world, but to my own personal
evolution.It is a reminder that
even when I feel stagnated, I am growing and changing in ways I cannot
necessarily perceive, and I must be patient with myself. And I remember that I am a tree, a
plant, with a rich inner life. And I remember that in stillness, in active
nothingness, I am energized.
Amongst all this, I sense the power of the inner world, the
unseen forces, and the natural order that connects it all.
You are on to something. I encourage you to follow this vision.
William Byrd’s O Gloriosa Domina is exquisite.I feel a great sense of breadth and emotion
from just three voices—rather amazing.Reminds me of a Pandora station I have been listening to lately called
Serbian Chants (Byzantine Choirs, Gregorian Chants, and the like).It is reminiscent of going to Catholic church as a kid.I always did kinda like the ritual and
the stained glass and the sound…rather otherworldly.I’m not sure why I started listening to this lately—and it
is mostly a background to my work, not the forefront of my attention—but I
connect to its energy, it’s mood.The music of voices.
My ignorance of music is
vast. However I’m enjoying learning
new things through this collaboration.
I googled “turangalila” and was lead to the symphony of Olivier
Messiaen, and this, per Wikipedia:
“The title of the work, and those of its
movements, were a late addition to the project. They were first described by
Messiaen in a diary entry in early 1948.[4]He derived the title from twoSanskritwords,turangaandlîla, which roughly translate into English as
"love song and hymn of joy, time, movement, rhythm, life, and death",[7]and described the joy of Turangalîla as
"superhuman, overflowing, dazzling and abandoned".
The bold is mine--the parts where I find relationship to the microcosmos. In Be Love Now Ram Dass speaks of the lila as the divine play, with the devotee as God's partner in the divine dance. He also writes. "All planes exist within the One. Paradoxically, the One is also a plane of consciousness. But from within the One there's no subjective experiencer, because the One can only experience itSelf. That's the paradox, the mystery of existence that creates the play of forms, the dance, or lila. A perfected being is no longer an actor in the play moving in and out of planes, going up or coming down. The subjective self has disappeared in the merging of subject and object, the One."
I also looked up motet, which is most
simply described as “A
polyphonic composition based on a sacred text and usually sung without accompaniment.” Which, of course meant I had to look up
polyphonic (also interesting), and so on.
This
idea makes me think of how you used the voice as music and form for
SpoonTree:
Ok so firstly, I really like the points you made, they highlight things I had intuited but not considered deeply - e.g.
In a way the question of inner weather or outer weather is two sides of a coin, flipped by perspective—does the light/sound represent the inner world or the outer—It’s a choice, like heads or tails.
I like "the implicit unity" you talk about. More to the point the next paragraph, for me, is right on the money:
Is it crazy (from a logistics standpoint) to be imaging within the Microcosmos small worlds/objects/groups of objects that have sound and light that come from within them, as well as there being sound and light that is external—in the space of the room and in the object(s).Could the light and sound of the inner voice/weather be choreographed to make meaning and relation to the outer voice/weather?
This leads me to visual it like this: the experience of the Microcosmos is of entering a space - the space feels limitless, it is dark and contains numerous lit objects, multiple sounds emanate from within the space. It makes it feel as though sounds and objects are not always visible - some objects are only glimpsed at certain times - some sounds emerge from the darkness.
Almost like a conversation happening between the object and the room. The inner forces and outer forces in tandem.Sometimes in harmony, sometimes perhaps dissonance; sometimes happening both at once, other times one alone.
Echoing each other’s sentiments, or arguing against them.You wrote about exploring adding sound to static images—perhaps what I’m suggesting would be like the sound of two static images expressing themselves to one another.Or in reaction to one another.Perhaps this is close to what you are already imagining.
It’s hard to say, all that sound/light might be too chaotic. I also often find that more is not necessarily better, and simple can be quite powerful.
I couldn't agree more - a frustrating chaos needs to be avoided - we're making a piece of art rather than a complex mathematical model. I feel, from a sound point of view, the Microcosmos is kind of like a symphony - but this is an orchestra of soloists (this is actually something I do with time-coded scores). In free jazz people play very much this way but the results for me are often too chaotic, though sometimes extraordinary, whereas symphonies and orchestra repertoire are very precisely defined. I feel there could be moments in the Microcosmos where we are invited to consider a single object/location/sound, where everything else fades for a moment and, let's say for argument's sake, a red light picks out 'Tree-Spoon' and a solitary cello line plays (I imagine other things drop to the background rather than halt altogether).
I like the idea that certain parts of the system are only glimpsed - maybe only seen/heard at certain times - certainly I want to use the vertical plain - I have just made a sketch actually that has an array of 22 speakers at body height with 9 overhead and 1 at floor level - this gives sound the chance to move vertically around the microcosmos and, if used sparingly, to add an extended dimension.
Also, if we’re not careful this whole thing will be saccharine sweet,
Actually, I'm not worried about this. It will be a space that embodies our own creative responses to the subject - neither of us are much into saccharine sweet - it's always good to flag the question, of course, just to make sure it doesn't end up that way but I think we're both looking towards a deeper exploration of elements here.
So, my question: what do you feel about objects that are not always seen? For example, I mentioned previously some of the 'uterus' imagery you used - I don't specifically mean using those, but I'm interested in the idea of imagery that is only revealed at certain times - perhaps it's at the walls or above us or on the floor (?) We've touched on chakras in conversation - they, of course, have associated colours, do you feel that plays a part in this. Also; how do you see the 'prosaic' objects? Do they have a specific reason for being there? i.e. is a cup, spoon etc symbolic, metaphoric? It feels like dream imagery to me, but I don't know what the dream is telling me - which is not at all a bad thing - I think the idea I've suggested here of having things that only reveal at certain times is in part my own wish to say that the Microcosmos is mysterious, it doesn't lay out all the answers, it also lays out unanswered riddles, perhaps.
I'm itching to write a reply to Megan's last post - I'll hope to do it tomorrow, Before I do I just wanted to post up my thoughts as I arrived here in Valencia yesterday - half asleep at the end of the flight.
I started imagining the final ten or so minutes - I imagined, arising from all sorts of disparate sound-worlds, spread across the space, a unified sound, what I jotted down as a turangalilla - a joyous, painful, dance of life - the only sound that I think would do that would be the human voice - I have no idea whether a text or something wordless, a feeling that, as we've journeyed through the internal weathers of the microcosmos we've finally arrived at something that somehow transcends it.
Of course, it's just an idea, but I think it would be interesting to investigate - as a vague pointer, here's some early music: William Byrd - Byrd's motets are some of my most treasured sounds to listen to - in this recording there are only 3 voices - I love the fact that 3 people, simply standing side by side, can make this sound. I'm not imagining the final sounds of the microcosmos being this exactly, but something of it's nature is very appealing to me:
My Microcosmos question at the moment is - we have 'invisible
seasons' or 'internal weather' - do we have external weather? It feels like we
do but maybe it's invisible somehow - light or sound... I feel the Tao is going
to be a rich area for us - I got out the Tao Te Ching but nothing quite fell
into place....
And it got me thinking and looking back at some of the other
things you insightfully wrote about this topic:
As our ideas about 'emotional weather' develop so it becomes
easier to find ideas that work. Currently I think that there is a map for the
entire microcosmos - the map covers both time and space - it maps the
trajectories of the weather throughout the time period - so it will show how
the 'weather' passes around the microcosmos, defining migrations of that
weather. Perhaps certain sounds will be associated with certain emotions or
perhaps specific musical ideas will have that function*
[*I want to go into this last sentence more, in a separate
post, and am putting this note here to remind myself to do so and include my
ideas on material and mood/meaning]
You also wrote:
I could see this
tree soaking up the weather, nourished by the weather, shaped by the weather, beaten
by the weather - but then I remembered something I had written and used many
times: "we attach meaning to events, but events happen in the universe and
meaning happens in the human heart" - suddenly the image of these
individual static microcosms, their visual content unchanging but their sonic
and light colouration changing - rang true - I suddenly felt the microcosmos
was like looking at 100 people, or a million people - the physical appearance
unchanging with each one, but the inner, unseen landscapes nourished and
battered by 'invisible seasons'.
In a way the question of inner
weather or outer weather is two sides of a coin, flipped by perspective—does
the light/sound represent the inner world or the outer—It’s a choice, like
heads or tails.
As I mull all this over, I feel
the paradox of what you may be reaching for in your question—how does one make
experiential an inner state and outer state simultaneously.Are we expressing an inner weather or
an external weather?In a way it
is both, depending on how the visitor perceives it (or is guided to perceive
it)—is the sound/light representative of an inner voice of the object(s) or an
outer force that the object(s) exists in.Inner emotional weather, or outer worldly weather.I see where you reached for the Tao, in
that it speaks so much of that space in between that is not either thing and
both things at once.Not so unlike
our own paradoxical puzzle….I think we are trying to speak of something that is
two separate things, internal and external, while also pointing out the
connecting sameness between both things; the implicit unity.
It has been a reoccurring thread
emerging in my life lately that I am a microcosm for the world around me, and
the world outside me is a macrocosm of my inner landscape.I was describing it today as
skiing.Riding two parallel
tracks—one my inner world, one the outer world—simultaneously, yet sometimes
leaning onto one more than the other depending on my directional need,
depending on where I’m trying to go or what I’m trying to understand.Either way, they work in tandem.I often find when I learn something
about the nature of my inner world, it can be applied to the nature of the
outer world, and vice versa.
Circling back to the
Microcosmos….Inner weather and outer weather, working in tandem.Is it crazy (from a logistics
standpoint) to be imaging within the Microcosmos small worlds/objects/groups of
objects that have sound and light that come from within them, as well as there
being sound and light that is external—in the space of the room and in the
object(s).Could the light and
sound of the inner voice/weather be choreographed to make meaning and relation
to the outer voice/weather? Almost like a conversation happening between the
object and the room. The inner forces and outer forces in tandem.Sometimes in harmony, sometimes perhaps
dissonance; sometimes happening both at once, other times one alone.Echoing each other’s sentiments, or
arguing against them.You wrote
about exploring adding sound to static images—perhaps what I’m suggesting would
be like the sound of two static images expressing themselves to one
another.Or in reaction to one
another.Perhaps this is close to
what you are already imagining.
It’s hard to say, all that
sound/light might be too chaotic.I also often find that more is not necessarily better, and simple can be
quite powerful.Also, if we’re not
careful this whole thing will be saccharine sweet, and we’ll have a cute one-liner
about seasons.Kinda like a Hallmark
card (do you know what I mean when I say that?)I’m made to think of this decoration my mother would put up
every Christmas: little painted ceramic buildings make up a town around a
ceramic pond with a mirror on top for ice; little people skate around the pond
(by magnets) while a Christmas tune plays; the little houses are lit up from
within by Christmas lights.It’s
all very quaint and kinda beautiful and mesmerized me as a kid.But it had no depth.No layers of meaning.It was a one-liner, and a kitsch one at
that.I think we have the
potential to make the Microcosmos multi-layered and meaningful, both
intellectually and experientially.Also think sometimes seeing what you don’t want to be like helps form
what you do want to be like.
So, in summary: Do we have
internal weather/seasons—yes, I think that’s part of what is going to make this
meaningful, to us as explorers and to visitors as experiencers. The question is how do we represent this
internal world (visuals, sound, light, suggestion). Do we have external
weather—yes, I think so.By
default of creating landscapes (my sculptures) we will have either weather or
geography (ie. a snowy tundra in the arctic may not look too different than the
plains of the Midwest on a winters day).So maybe part of the question is do we utilize sound/light in
representing an external force, an internal force, or both? I see two
scenarios—there is light and sound in the space and it represents inner or
outer forces, depending on how we choose to perceive it and encourage others to
perceive it (two sides same coin); or there is light and sound coming from the
objects and from the space itself, each force—inner and outer—getting its own
voice and light representation.
I posted this piece on a different blog - but I wanted to put it up here because it came out of my experiences of Blue Mountain - it also talks a little about the place itself:
Here’s a suggestion if you’re reading this blog – as it centres on a piece of music, you may want to hit play now and then read the story behind it as it plays. (It will sound best on headphones or on full range speakers, rather than the speakers of a computer. If you just want to read about the piece of music just scroll down to where it says ‘About the piece’).
Utowana
Lake Utowana
The Adirondacks, as I recently discovered, are a 6,000,000 acre wilderness in upstate New York about 5 hours north of New York City. For September of this year I was offered a residency at the Blue Mountain Centre to work on an opera and, while I had been told it would be beautiful, my friends in New York City had sternly warned me: “it’ll be cold!” their voices had sounded concerned, “have you got thermal underwear?” they asked.
So I headed off on the train from Penn Station, journeying north with the expectation of spending the next month hunkered down in a studio peering out through icicles at a bare, prematurely wintered woodland.
But as it turned out I rarely needed a coat at Blue Mountain, most of the days in September required no more than a T-shirt. I rowed on Eagle Lake by moonlight, listened to the mysterious dreamlike calls of the loons in the night, participated in a moose-calling competition at the local fair, played far too many games of bananagrams with great people and ate and drank like a rogue hog on vacation.
Eagle Lake from near the composer studio.
The only problem I had was that sitting in my studio during the day writing a heavyweight opera turned out to be difficult when outside a glittering Eagle Lake gently lapped the shore, especially as I’d occasionally glimpse one or two of the other residents whisking past in a canoe, looking fabulously happy in the sunshine.
It’s no great surprise: I didn’t complete the opera as planned on the trip. Even though I felt that was the important thing to be doing, the interaction with the other artists and activists, the days of canoeing, kayaking and hiking – even with the distinction of being the only person to overturn his kayak – brought me such a wealth of new experience and joy that in the end I concluded that my time there was spent in the best, most productive way possible.
Does that sound like an excuse? Do you require proof?
It was hard for me to describe in words the previously unknown world of adirondack lakes, but I’m a composer, so I took to music. The work for orchestra that plays at the start of this page is a little of what I'm talking about, it wouldn’t exist but for those excursions, the imprint they made on me and which I carry with me, influences and informs new pieces and approaches.
Lake Utowana, Eagle Lake, Blue Mountain Lake
Utowana is a lake that connects to Eagle Lake, where I was staying, which in turn connects to the much larger Blue Mountain Lake. It can be reached by a footpath through the woods or by rowing through the narrow strip that connects the two lakes.
I went there many times; it was extraordinarily peaceful, I was often the only person there so far as I could tell and it felt downright greedy to have so much beauty to myself.
About The Piece:
The idea of 'Utowana' the piece of music is that it represents a year in the life of the lake: Literally, the piece has a periodicity of 3.33' seconds per day (this happens to work out as a bar length at 72 beats per minute). I didn’t want this to feel like ‘accelerated time’, the kind of thing we’re used to with time-lapse photography. I wanted it to feel as though this was a natural sense of time, that what might feel like a year to a person might feel the equivalent of 20 minutes in the existence of the lake. I felt music offered a way to explore and experience this idea.
It was therefore my hope to make a piece that was not so much ‘my perspective on Utowana’ (though that’s inevitable) as ‘Utowana’s perspective’.
In the deep midwinter, where this piece begins and ends, I imagine there’s little sign of change on the lake but what I was interested in, which is represented by the slow moving strings at the start and end of the piece, was the idea of ‘energies’ or potentials, perhaps deep in the ground or in the movement of water beneath the ice.
I was interested in the way one thing arises in relationship to another in nature – this interdependence suggested to me a natural ‘harmony’, though one that also embraces the ‘dissonance’ of competition; the survival of the fittest. In the music, as in the lake, each major structure contains numerous minor structures: as musical motives evolve, emerge, interact and disappear, each instrument or group of instruments acts independently but they also respond to other sounds and instruments, much as the ecosystem of the lake is both complex and subtle, containing numerous independencies in a complex entangled web of interactions.
I also wanted to factor in the unsteady curve of development during a year – warm weather, snow storms and the like that can suddenly create growing spurts or put populations under strain, sudden changes across the entire system. So I contrived a few things over my fictitious year that would influence the music – to give a few examples:
At 5.40’ I imagine sudden warm weather causing a thaw and more rapid growth.
At 6.40’ a cold snap that inhibits or threatens development
At 7.10 warmth returns
At 8.00’ a dense snow storm blankets everything
And so on.
At 10.00’ I have changed the descriptive process a little – in the first half I have tried to evoke a picture of the lake in its entirety, but in the second half, where we’ve hit full summer and everything is going full tilt (its equivalent soundworld just felt too frenetic), I have created the equivalent of a moving camera that focusses on individual elements – so here it perhaps comes closest to a score for a wildlife documentary.
Ultimately, I’m just another artist seeking to reflect nature – I know I can’t hope to do justice to it, but perhaps with this piece I can convey a sense of not just standing there taking in the extraordinary peace of the place but a sense of the hidden, the life of the lake itself, the broader palettes of nature that, being human, we cannot fully take in with our eyes.
