exhibition - Cologne - cardiograph - mp3 (abode)

Cardiograph = mp3(abode) - 'requiem for a fly' - Helen's box
(3 works are murnaghan / murnaghan - kwi / kwi) also live performance 6th june
Galerie Rachel Haferkamp
eigelstein 112 - 50668 koln
Germany.

Mp3 abode is sound-based project which began in Arthouse in Dublin in November 2000, it involves a range of artists / participants from around the world. A request was sent out across the Internet inviting people to send an MP3 file of their favorite (or most hated) bite of sound, one that would evoke a strong personal emotion. When Murnaghan had received sufficient response he disguised a modern keyboard in a 120-year-old upright piano, It’s worn appearance empathic with it’s contents. An emotion was attached to each note and information as to the time, place and feeling associated with each sample was left in view. The piano interface is used to lend familiarity and to eradicate the cold computer interface. Visitors to the building are invited to play this collection of mp3’s, mixing a plethora of memories from around the world into moments of sound and interaction unique to the user.
Artists included: Marjetica Portc, Daniel Figgis, Karl Burke , Aisling O’Beirn and Slavek Kwi.
http://www.stunned.org/abode/a.htm
http://www.rte.ie/arts/2000/1207/mp3.html

In 'Requiem for a fly', Murnaghan explored one of the more prominent emotions that occurred in ‘mp3 abode’, the feeling of loss. The work invites you to sit into mourning chairs and pay respects to a dead fly laid to rest in his personal mausoleum. Using digital technology, the sounds of flies were manipulated to create different tones and resonance similar to the groupings in an orchestra, they were constructed into a musical arrangement of three movements. Murnaghan invited the sound artist Slavek Kwi to collaborate on this piece, they worked separately at first, Kwi wrote the introduction, Murnaghan the second part and they worked together on the third. There is humor in this work as there can be in death, a natural protective device and an invitation to sit and take part, it questions how / who we mourn and what we invest in death. Again the digital technology is not in evidence but it is crucial in the way that the sound is mixed, the sub-bass vibrates through you in the more emotional parts as the speakers are built into the chairs.