Concert: Pécs D(é)RIVE: GPS-Trans 11

When: Friday, 10 December · 19:30 – 22:30

Where: University of Pécs, Faculty of Music and Visual Arts, Damjanich u. 30, Pécs, Hungary

A collaborative project between Marek Chołoniewski & European Bridges Ensemble

live stream: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/symposium-installation-concert

“In a dérive one or more persons during a certain period drop their relations, their work and leisure activities, and all their other usual motives for movement and action, and let themselves be drawn by the attractions of the terrain and the encounters they find there. Chance is a less important factor in this activity than one might think: from a dérive point of view, cities have psychogeographi-cal contours, with constant currents, fixed points and vortexes that strongly discourage entry into or exit from certain zones.”
Guy Debord 1956

In July 2010, a car fitted with 4 video cameras, (facing forward, backward, left and right) and GPS tracking, made a number of “recording” journeys through and around the city of Pécs. Several of the locations passed through were then re-visited on foot, and recorded audio-visually in greater detail.

During the concert, a car will re-trace the original journeys around Pécs, transmitting its GPS coordinates to the venue where it will control the video and audio material, projected onto 4 screens and through 4 speakers arranged in form of square geometric object, simulating the form of the car and the space through which it travels. In this way the car becomes a live performer/controller of its own recordings. It’s GPS position and speed data determining the status of the audio-visual record of the original journey.

(GPS-Trans – transmission in time and space, rather than live broadcasting).

As the car approaches each of the previously chosen locations, the journey will be suspended and overlaid by detailed audio-visual compositions created by EBE’s composer/performers and visual artist, as responses to the ambience of place rather than to the transit through space. A place is explored and articulated and the journey resumes on to the next.

In the early stages of the project, initial exploration of the ‘terrain’ of Pécs revealed locations and spaces not on the “tourist trail”; the mines and mine buildings, the gas/water pipes, the cemetary, the tallest empty building as well as those more commonly experienced by visitors like the center or the TV Tower. Their qualities and ambience contributed a deeper experience of the city of Pécs.

Pécs D(é)RIVE, the latest iteration of “GPS-Trans”, combines the data-driven audio-visual urban installation, originally conceived by Marek Chołoniewski, with the integrated performance of audio-visual compositions by EBE within Georg Hajdu’s Quintet.net software environment.

Creators and performers:
Marek Choloniewski – concept, composition, coordination
Georg Hajdu – Conductor, Quintet.net programming
Marcin Wierzbicki – GPS programming
Kai Niggemann – Composition, Laptop Performer
Adam Siska – Composition, Laptop Performer
Johannes Kretz – Composition, Laptop Performer, Quintet.net programming
Andrea Szigetvári – Composition, Laptop Performer
Ivana Ognjanović – Composition, Laptop Performer
Stewart Collinson – Visual artist

Here is a video of an older performance (2007) of the EBE:

 

Organized by: Hungarian Computer Music Foundation

Sponsors: EU Culture Program, NKA, Nikolaus Lenau Kulturverein, MAMI PTE MK, Kertész Panzió, VisualPower

More information: www.globalvillagemusic.net

 

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