Musica Universalis
Musica Univeralis + Eternal Equations Of Love
Anne Marie Deacy & Eimear Murphy
Curated by Lindsay Merlihan and Méabh Noonan
Galway International Arts Festival, 126 Artist Run Gallery, The Hidden Valley, Galway, Ireland.
Cosmic Tones / Sun Sonic
Copper Sheets, 2 x 200cm x 100 cm, electronic devices, vibrating a 2-Channel composition - celestial tuning forks & crystal bowls.
This work evolved from research on the resonance of materiality, philosophies on vibration, memory, past ideologies on a universal harmony and the connection between sound, ritual & healing at a time when the world feels at crisis point, disconnected, overly medicated and lost in a anthropocentric daze.
Installation shot of Cosmic Tones / Sun Sonic & Crossing Into The Electric Magnetic i & ii
After passing the pillars you were faced with
Cosmic Tones / Sun Sonic
2 Suspended sheets of 2m x 1m copper. The reflected light representing a copper sun, these monuments were made to be engaged with, one could enter between the sheets, which were vibrating with a two channel piece made from a composition of tuning forks sounding frequencies of selected celestial bodies.
A nod to a past more connected to the cosmos, one would resonate with the work, as an offering and space of recalibration through listening, this work was an ode to the Sun.
The composition of over 10 minutes on loop resonated in the materiality, the listener and the space.
A walk through Musica Universalis.
On entering the gallery one encounters Crossing Into The Electric Magnetic i & ii.
2 pillars standing 2.3 meters tall, each column nearly 2km of handwoven .4mm copper. Unnoticeable to our ear, these two coils are constantly pulling in and omitting electromagnetic radiation around them. They were built to be activated, so we could listen into them, tuning into the invisible. The base designed with room for a speaker using the pipe as a resonator but as they would be omitting a constant hum, it was not the correct time for this sounding but they stood vibrating even if going unheard.
All work was made as stand alone sculptures. Rich in its materiality, through participation, exchange, transducers and electro-magnetic induction this work explores recalibration through harmony, dissonance and collective listening as activism.
They stood stoic, poignant and nodding to another time, inspired by the pillars of a Shinto torii, holding all the spirts of those who had passed, once one passed there was a cleansing, the mundane could be left behind. The name is an homage to the Halim El Dabh piece Crossing into the electric magnetic.
Cascade, And Otherness Steel, mylar, electronics 350cm x 73cm x 250cm (modular and scaled to building)
Multi-Channel Composition, field recordings: waterfall, bog, voice: Claudia Barton
The waterfall piece Cascade, And Otherness,
stands 3.5 meters tall, made of box steel and mylar. This form through its composition grieves and reverberates through the steel work with the voice and sounding of Claudia Barton, layered under the field recordings of a waterfall and sounds of the ancient waters rippling through the bog at Derrigimlagh in Clifden, once the site of and still baring witness and the marks of the first transatlantic wireless messages that would have been transmitted as a Marconi Wireless Station and the landing of the first transatlantic flight.
This work the final piece to stand with the others is the transience of memory, the need we have to communicate emotions incorporated into myths on waterfalls as past temples, connected with healing, loss and renewal.
Mylar was chosen due to its links to space travel, thermal protection, a material used in distress, a way of signalling for help. The title inspired by Sun Ra. The composition is 5min 46 sec and activates every 10minutes.
Images from studio in The National Sculpture Factory in Cork as the work evolved and was constructed
A special thank you to artist Claudia Barton for giving so generously of her time and talent and being the voice in the composition as part of the sculpture Cascade, And Otherness.
This work was made while on residency in the National Sculpture Factory in Cork, where I would like to thank the sculpture factory team,
fellow studio artists and a special thanks to technical manager Dominic Fee.
Also I would like to thank my fellow residents at The Guesthouse Project Cork for their continued encouragement.
Last but not least a huge thank you to all at the artist ran Gallery 126 for keeping the show going,
fellow artist in this two person show, Eimear Murphy + Eternal Equations Of Love,
& the powerhouse curatorial vim of Lindsay Merlihan & Méabh Noonan.
Kindly supported by Arts council Of Ireland & Galway International Arts Festival 2023.
Thank you also to the Galway County Arts Office.