- jojomatthewsart
Updated: May 12
Project design idea
It's a dialogue
Where are we going?
A dialogue with the Starfish and me through sounds
Travelling through the sand and out into the cosmos
A conversation with a dying Starfish
A multi-channel sound installation. Place the listener inside the sound spatially – speakers like that used in Susan Hiller's work 'Witness', hanging from the ceiling. Translucent speakers, delicate.
Is this a video work? Is it just sound?
I will use the voice and edited field recordings for this work. Why the voice? There is an intimacy with the voice that can be achieved better than other instruments, it comes from the person, it's sensual, it's unique to the person it comes from. Whispering, chilling.
Residency at The Burnished, Bamff Eco-tourism in Mid March with George Finlay Ramsay
I've recorded sounds whilst away on residency that will make up the sound performance. I've started editing these sounds.
Some sounds in development:
Could be one of the 'voices of a Starfish' (click to listen)
Travelling through down into the beach? Dialogue with dying starfish (click to listen)
Playing with communication - voice work (click to listen)
Writing is a part of the process of this work, it also is feeding into my audio essay about ecological intimacy and meandering. Updated writing from Fieldnotes
References for the sound performance
'Technological Phantasmagorias I, II, III' at Tramway Glasgow in 2009 (can't find the image)
Samuel Beckett 'No I' 1973 staging
Bjork's keening track 'Ancestors'
Susan Hiller's sound installation 'Witness'
Which I saw/experienced at the Tate in 2011
susanhiller.org/installations/witness_video.html
Paulina Anna Strom's track 'Marking Time'
- jojomatthewsart
What do I want the audience to experience?
What questions do I want to pose?
What kind of event can happen?
Where is my concept? Do I need one? I've mostly worked with a strong concept at the beginning, now where am I at?
Could I make a sculpture of a score, placed in front of a sculpture
I am making gestures with drawings, sound making, writing, performing
Immediacy of gesture
Subjective social science
I am making scores for ecological engagement, ecological intimacy, vocal and physical performance. Could I make a book of scores with the sound drawings?
- jojomatthewsart
Listen to a rough recording of text read aloud here:
https://static.wixstatic.com/mp3/d4db6f_56ab5aa0d09b4b7c933a3bcdf247bdf8.wav
All there is
Lean in
The tide exposes
When I sing to the seaweed my vibrations remain in the atmosphere as an energy form.
We cannot see the slow-moving tidal sea rise with human eyes, maybe that’s why we are not prepared.
The Turnstones survive in the intertidal space
A drowning out
We are already underwater
I bottle the eeriness of sea haar
In the haar
It’s like everyone has been put to sleep
Hazy, humming, murky horizons
Its dripping and close
Is there a moment where the haar hits my face?
I am walking through the mist
When am I not walking through the mist?
When am I passed it?
Mist is magical
I am walking through an altered time zone
The seaweed sways slowly
hhhhhhmmmmmmmmmmm hhhhhhhmmmmmmmmmmmm
Chck chck, chck, chck chck chck
Inside the mist I do not feel alone
I forget where I am
It’s a blanket, a cold blanket, I am covered in cold
My senses are heightened
I am hyper-aware
The mist is revealing
The moisture brings to light things that I do not normally see
The lowering of the sky creates a darker reflection
My eyes and nose are leaking
The mist draws out my liquid
This weather is comforting and dark
It’s something in between
Half dead, half alive
The salt is saltier
The seaweed looks like floating dead bodies preserved, salinated
My spatial awareness is misty
I am at the surface of the water
slightly drowning
bobbing at the edge
gasping for air
the heat pulses around my body
my skin colour changes
a clump of seaweed floats by and brushes my leg
I shiver
I’m in the sea and it’s raining
the feeling is like nothing I’ve ever felt before
I feel alive
I feel connected
I feel like I am where I am supposed to be
As the sea levels rise the crevices diminish
No longer allowed to be vulnerable
A saltiness
A heavy saltiness in the bay
Heavy salt
I am covered in salt
I am made of salt
The rocks
My body
The air is salt