The official opening of the Sonic Acts Festival at the Stedelijk Museum features A Script for Machine Synthesis, a multisensory performance by Florian Hecker.
The first iteration of this work was presented at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, and is specifically adapted for Sonic Acts. The piece is the climactic third chapter in the trilogy of text–sound pieces that Hecker created in collaboration with Reza Negarestani. It follows their collaborations Chimerization, for dOCUMENTA (13) and also released on Mego; and Hinge, which featured legendary vocalist Joan La Barbara. The piece Hecker will perform at the Stedelijk is, in his own words, an experimental drama, which recalls Artaud’s Theatre of Cruelty as much as Beckett’s minimalist narratives. Reza Negarestani wrote an experimental libretto, which provides Hecker with the text–sound materials for his sound composition. On their earlier collaboration Chimerization, Pitchfork wrote that: ‘Hecker layers, bowties, refracts, reverses, and otherwise disrupts the voices reading the work. Syllables careen into unseen voids or sublimate into sudden glitches. Phrases chase one another in unsettling antiphony, and sentences jerk to seasick rhythms.’
Read more about Florian Hecker and Sonic Acts in Gonzo (circus) #125
Thursday February 26th, 2015
Info and tickets: sonicacts.com