Floor Flute (pictured) is a sculptural piece created by friend and Miami based artist Robert Chambers. The piece is part of the Ella Fontanal-Cisneros collection. It was included in the exhibition Fortunate Objects curated by Cecilia Fajardo-Hill. When manipulated the piece makes sound, but it isn’t build to allow for this kind of interaction by the public.
At Robert’s suggestion, I was commissioned by Cifo in late 2007 to create a sound situation to augment the impact of Robert’s piece. At first our conversations revolved around a piece that would play through speakers in the room, not integrated.
Instead my idea was to thread tinny speakers through the sculpture and develop a mini 5.1 surround sound piece that matched each sound in the sculpture with the object that generated it. So the sound of the recorder would come from the recorder’s location, the sound of the whistles from their physical location, and so on, all inside a three feet square radius. The sound of the large 18th century church bellow was also recorded and routed to the sub-woofer speaker which is located behind the sculpture.
An audio recording of this work is included in the limited edition art CD Box Indivisibles, available from Subtropics Editions.
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Facts about FFFFF
Format: 5.1 surround audio DVD
Equipment: Sony HT-IS100 home theater system, the Cuban-cafecito-cup-size speakers threaded into the Floor Flute.
Recorded and mastered @ iSAW, Miami, FL – 2007
Score: FFFFF-score
Sample Audio: Note: a longer piece is included in Indivisibles
Three Breaths from FFFFF |
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History and Documentation
Exhibition: Fortunate Objects (Dec 5, 2007 – Feb 24, 2008) / CIFO, Miami / PR (Link)
Opening Performance: Dec 5, 2007 / Program (PDF)
Coverage: art in america (PDF)
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