Gretchen and The Rain

live audio installation

contact microphones, stethoscopes, piano, caldrons, water


PAF, St. Erme, France
September 13 – 18 2009


‘Gretchen and The Rain’ is a first attempt within a larger research project around the question of how to bring human narratives out into the environment for to release them there.

This first sketch consists in hacking an existing machine in such a way that it works as a cathartic instrument, in ‘Gretchen and The Rain’ replacing compositional decisions slowly by the sound of natural, apparently random, and incidental phenomena, such as the sound of falling rain.

In such actions I envision an existing piece [a residency participant exercising the piano in the chapel of the monastery in St. Erme] played into the environment, while actual, live sound elements of the environment are slowly disintegrating the composed material down to its bones.
In this way the composed material, until to its’ structure, slowly gets ‘washed away’ over time.


Within this research project I experiment with technological, structural, and conceptual methods of emptying data.

Is it actually possible to get rid of data? And if so, how?
How long do you think it might take?





organized by Nadine:
http://www.nadine.be/bulk-logs/artist-in-residence/st-aimé

location: Performing Arts Forum, St. Erme, France
http://www.pa-f.net



installation views

live audio-video [documentation]