Opening Reception | 2 New Works byPhillip Stearns & Drone 4x | An Evening of Music

Fruiting Bodies of High-Voltage Transmission Lines
Lament II - Sand & Silt

New Works By Phillip Stearns


Opening Reception + Concert
A 21+ Event: Suggested Donation of $5

Space-time Coordinates:
7pm @ The Commons NYC | 388 Atlantic Ave. Brooklyn, 11217 (Boerum Hill)

Installations (7-8:30p):

"Fruiting Bodies of High-Voltage Transmission Lines"
A new sound work by Phillip Stearns

"Lament II: Sand & Silt"
A sound & video installation by Phillip Stearns (in progress/workshop session)

Concert (8:30-11p):

"Drone 4x" Featuring Performances by:
David Kant
Jeff Donaldson (Notendo)
Loud Objects
Pete Edwards (Casper Electronics)

About the Work

Fruiting Bodies of High Voltage Transmission Lines
8 speakers produce 8 approximate sine tones, independently fading in and out at slow but regular rates. Silence is broken by a single tone slowly growing louder. That tone is joined by others forming a chord. This chord morphs into a tonal cluster, a sonority active with overlapping beat frequencies, melting away into a suspenseful chord and then swelling again, evolving into subtle but unique sonorities, occasionally returning to silence. The piece works with simple cyclical forms to produce a long form non-repeating drone composition that forms a meditative sonic environment for contemplating the visual form of the installation. Salvaged speakers and handmade, reusable electronics are arranged in an organic, almost biological, visual composition that draws connective metaphorical threads between the flow of electricity in our cities to the water in our rivers and the blood through our veins.

Lament II: Sand & Silt
The Lament series is centered around the perception of cyclical time and the relationship between society and the environment. The work drawing upon our connection to the earth through astronomically driven biological cycles. All material for the Lament series was derived from the interactions of sine tones oscillating across the spectrum of physical perception from motion, to sound and finally light. The sinusoidal waveform signifies a pure cyclical and temporal process, one that is intimately linked to the revolution of planets, their orbit about the sun, the changing of tides, and the topography of water in motion. The Lament series stems from a meditation on a loss of innocence symbolized by the widespread polluting and subsequent destruction of our aquatic ecosystems.

Artist Bio

Phillip Stearns is an interdisciplinary multi-media artist and electronics arts educator. He received his master's degree in music composition and integrated media from Cal Arts in 2007. His work lies at the intersection of art, philosophy, and science, drawing upon a variety of disciplines and mediums including installation, audio-video work, circuit sculpture, writing, performance art and composition. He views electronics as complex artificial living systems, organisms existing within both ecosystems and economies. Thematic elements of his recent work focus on the global society-environment system, and how changes in the relationship between society and environment are manifest in our technology. A judicial use of materials and a careful balance between conceptual depth and playfulness inform his employment of hand-made custom electronics in the creation of generative systems. Through the medium of interactive networked systems (electronic & biological), the ecologies of information, interconnectedness and interrelatedness become central subjects. He has exhibited and presented his work at numerous festivals in the US, Northern Europe, and Latin America including Transitio_MX, FILE, NIME, FONLAD, and others. He is the current 2010 Van Lier Artist in Residence at Harvestworks.

contact: [email protected]
more info and projects: http://www.art-rash.com/pixelform