Akusmata

“?->?->?” v.1
sound installation by Martins Rokis

19.1. – 25.1.2015
Opening hours: Mon – Fri 14 – 18, Sat – Sun 14 – 17

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Finding information on the web depends on several factors, for example search engines inbuilt algorithms that “decides” how and which bits of information we are searching for are connected together. A folksonomy is one of the systems of classification and method of collaboratively creating and translating tags to annotate and categorize content. Thus relations between bits of information are decided via social consensus.

If we imagine this field of data as ocean, then in that ocean there are islands of information who’s existence is legitimized by users habits of classification. Navigation process from one point to another in this ocean of data can be full of surprises as peoples believes which things are related to others. This notion of collectively created map of information is starting point for installation “?->?->?“.

Custom software built for installation uses Freesound, a repository of Creative Commons licensed audio samples, whose content can be tagged and browsed by folksonomic means. By manually choosing first search word the automatic navigation process begins and  sonic environment is created from user uploaded audio samples that inhabits similar information space according to collectively added meta data. So in this context collective mind, layers of meaning and culture serves as notation for automatic composition.

Martins Rokis is working with sound and visuals in different contexts/forms, exploring multimodality of human perception via installations, performances or works for multichannel systems.

http://www.martinsrokis.com/

Note: Martins Rokis’ live performance on January 16th, 7pm
at Vapaan Taiteen Tila, Helsinki

BIOMIMESIS VII
multichannel sound installation

2.5. – 10.5.2014

Opening hours: Mon – Fri 14-18, Sat 14-17

Biomimesis is a serie of works that can be realized as site-specific installations, performances, multichannel compositions or something in-between. Custom-made software generates sound structures, which are based on ‘nature-inspired sound design’, models and processes. These sounds evolve in a spontaneous manner, they have not been composed, or follow any strict musical laws. Rather, they simulate a soundscape of some acoustic everyday space — the one on the street, in a forest or elsewhere, where sounds, according to John Cage, ‘live their lives’.

These ‘field recordings from nonexistent places’ without clear origin or context seem recognizable and familiar, evoking personal associations and cultural projections, yet in the same time alien, otherworldly and unidentifiable, blurring boundaries between what we consider natural and artificial. Listeners can ‘zoom’ in or out on various elements that make the whole soundscape, segregating or integrating them, discovering new details or subtle changes.

Martins Rokis is working with sound and visuals in different contexts, forms, crossing boundaries between so-called computer music, psychedelic noise and abstract sound art, blending generative strategies with improvisation and also occasionally making sound installations or works for multichannel systems.

http://www.martinsrokis.com/

SKIN ARCHIVE
sound installation

6.3. – 31.3.2014

Opening hours: Mon – Fri 14-18

Skin is the largest organ in human body. It senses temperatures, pressure, pain and pleasure, and preserves vast of memories, feelings, and stories. Today, the pervasive presence of skin is evident; skin is both an object of constant control and aesthetic modification as well as a crucial signifier of difference in the diverse cultural negotiations.

Skin Archive sound installation listens to skin through the touch it senses. The archive, which usually is understood as an official and formal categorizing and storing system, is in this case treated as unofficial, highly selective and as constantly flickering on pleasure/pain axis.

The sound material is created of recordings that are made i.e. at the boxing club, in sauna, at the tattoo studio and under the water. In these recordings the skin becomes porous as sweating, palpated, stroked, rubbed, sucked, pierced with needle, and scratched.

Skin Archive is a collection of selected ephemeral touches, and it invites the listener/spectator to recall also her or his own skin/touch stories and histories. The spoken narratives are written and told by students of Aalto University, Pori Unit of the Department of Art.

Special thanks to Marianne Decoster-Taivalkoski, Heikki Kossi, Tero Nauha, Merja Pesola, Elina Saloranta, Hannu Vuorinen and the students at the Aalto University, Pori Unit of the Department of Art: Pauliina Koivunen, Ismo-Pekka Heikinheimo, Suvi Härkönen, Gerardo Montes de Oca and Kristiina Saloluoma.
Image: Pirjo Mönttinen

Taina Riikonen is a Helsinki-based sound explorer who works with sounds and texts. Her current interests are diverse bodily sounds, machine sounds and urban vibrations. Riikonen’s work history includes radio works, sound installations, live performances and soundscapes for business purposes.

http://nomadicbreathhelsinki.wordpress.com

INSECT SYNC
a multichannel installation

8.11. – 15.11.2013

Opening hours: Mon – Fri 14-18

David Rothenberg, author of the recently released BUG MUSIC (book and CD), turns this work into a new sound installation Insect Sync for Akusmata, based on the two basic ways insects synchronize their sounds: overlapping irregular rhythms, and overlapping songs that blur into a drone. The drone sounds are based on the song of the seventeen year cicada, and the rhythmic patterns are based on the song of the snowy tree cricket.

The multi-channel sound installation also includes sounds from other surprising insects: Uhlers Katydid, said to have the most complex of all insect sounds, the Common True Kaydid, and the Pine Sawyer Beetle.

Additional synthetic sounds, inspired by the insect world, are added from computer and iPad.

T.G. Forrest, image

www.bugmusicbook.com

KOIROHI
15.10. – 20.10.2013

Koirohi is created from sound recordings from the active nuclear power plant located in Olkiluoto, Finland. With sensitive contact microphones and accelerometers placed directly on turbines, boilers, and thousands of meters of pipes above and below the ground, vibrations from the production of nuclear power can be heard. Since all these elements vibrate at very different rates and through different materials the sounds are rich in overtones, and have an almost dreamy or unearthly quality. Akusmata gallery premieres a 4-channel realization of the work. Koirohi means wormwood in Estonian, like Chernobyl means wormwood in Ukrainian.

Jacob Kirkegaard’s (*1975, Denmark) works are focused on scientific and aesthetic aspects of sonic perception. He explores acoustic spaces and phenomena that usually remain imperceptible to the immediate ear. Kirkegaard’s installations, compositions & photographs are created from within a variety of environments such as subterranean geyser vibrations, empty rooms in Chernobyl, a rotating TV tower, and even sounds from the human inner ear itself.

Jacob Kirkegaard website

The exhibition has been arranged in cooperation with
Nordic Music Days 2013