Blog archive July 2021
18.07.21 / 01 / ryoji ikeda vinyl
I bought technicolors, maybe just for the cover to make a Peter Saville-style display on my shelves. It is at least playable unlike the locked grooves of The Solar System. I also got music for installations vol 1 CD and booklet, and a catalogue/book. Note to self - ask prices of things before buying armfuls... I just can’t resist the aesthetics. They gave me the tote bag for free to carry all the stuff.
I had to play ’technicolors’ to digitise it - there is no digital download. The tracks are indeed all species of ’coloured noise’, except ‘black noise’ which is a track of complete silence! It’s a tribute to the vinyl quality that it is indeed silent. When I turned it up very loud there was a machine hum from somewhere in the digitisation process, that would not be audible under any other circumstance, but still no vinyl sound at all.
It’s such a perverse set of tracks to issue as vinyl only, given that digital or CD guarantees the purity of the sound and silence. The silent track assures the listener that all the sound of the other tracks is intentional and not vinyl artefacts.
‘music for installations vol 1’ turned out to be the actual sound of Ikeda's installations, which is weird as I’d never thought that the sound was separable from the visuals. So when I listen to it I see the visuals, at least of the ones I’ve seen.
11.07.21 / 01 / ryoji ikeda
Ryoji Ikeda solo exhibition at 180 Studios.
Above: data-verse 1, 2 and 3. I haven't recorded the part with the sun, stars, the galaxy, the universe etc. The whole thing is a kind of update on the Eames' 'Powers of Ten'.
Above: test pattern no. 12.
Above: point of no return. Evoking the experience of a 'black hole' in space.
Of course the actual installations have very high resolution and detail which never comes across in phone videos. And the colour effects in ‘point of no return’ and ’test pattern’ are camera artefacts whereas the human eye sees [almost] monochrome.
It was a slightly suboptimal experience as we were ushered round in groups - not enough time in some places and not possible to go back. But we did spend 15 minutes or so with data-verse which was worth the price of admission alone. I’m a bit tempted to see it again and pay attention to different parts.
