collective imaginary

The accompanying video—which became the inspiration for much of the material in the electronics—is a cut-up of various short films by New Zealand visual artist Len Lye (1901–1980). Lye created the visual textures and rhythms that you see here by directly applying paint to celluloid film. The rates of motion are, therefore, imposed by the technology itself (25Hz). 

 

The choice to use abstract visuals was made relatively late during work on this piece. I had originally intended the piece to be a sort of soundtrack to an obscure documentary from the 1960s, the use of which, without going into detail, became in appropriate following the invation of Ukraine in February 2022. In any case, the instrumental material, which is somewhat more static and minimal than usual for me, was intended from the outset to accompany video. The harmonic content regularly flirts with tonality to a point that I probably would have been uncomfortable with even a few years ago. It was somewhat liberating for me to work with material of such simplicity, where timbre is the only complex parameter.