22 May 2017

57th Venice Biennale - Topologies for a Vertical Sound

Topologies for a Vertical Sound serves as a midcareer survey of light and space artist Anne Katrine Senstad in collaboration with composer, philosopher and mathematician Catherine C. Hennix.

Topologies for a Vertical Sound presents Anne Katrine Senstad's practice on the phenomenology of perception of light, sound and space, aesthetic relations, immersive architectural site specific practice and social-political installation art in conjunction with Senstad's ongoing collaborations with Catherine C. Hennix. Hennix's poetic essay SONOILLUMINESCENCES will at this time be published virtually in concurrence with the exhibition, highlighting the historic significance of Hennix's specialized authorship in the areas of philosophy, mathematical theory, sound, religion, science and art. The text is conceived as a poem with accompanying illustrations and calligraphy by Hennix.

Honouring Hennix's extensive in depth practice and knowledge as a profound inspiration, the title for this exhibition is extracted from her texts and mathematical work on the infinitesimal as scientific, philosophical and spiritual concepts in relation to devotional sound, which was originally written to accompany her recording The Electric Harpsichord from 1978. The indestructible moment of Silence, The Empty Sound, relates to the void, absence of the exhibition as a void space, inviting the viewer to experience the dialectical phenomena of the art but not the physicality of presence.

The piece inspired Senstad to create her sensorial, experiential multiple projection, sound, fabric and aroma installation Sonoptic Parallels – The Infinitesimal, 2014-17, which includes the composition from Hennix's live performance Catherine Christer Hennix and Chora(s)san - Time-Court Mirage: Blues Dhikr Al-Salam (Blues Al Maqam) from the Grimm Museum in Austria and is the main interior large scale installation piece as part of this exhibition.

The Verticality of light and sound talk about the connection between elements, forces, realms of consciousness, universality of allness and the direct path of dialogue with the Universe. As discourses found in her site specificity and here in the void space, Senstad has developed an architecturally perceived light and color line sculptural space, drawing in space as we travel through it, yet in response to the charged resonances of archetypal devotional hierarchy. In working with technology, the analogue and narration of the space simultaneously, Senstad's employment of the veiled as a state of ideology or reality, emphasizing the hidden, or the subjective, seductive and the mysterious. Black fabrics engulfing the hallways of the devoted, yet displaying and enforcing the minimal light structures as symptomatic of the sensorial and intimate, involves - no requires - another territorial reclamation to experience in full. She suggests a merged light and spatial narrative, simultaneously exalting the perception of the historic charged space through suggestive black veils conveying a psychological space while referencing omnipresence of cultural and religious dogmatic ideas.

The semi transparent plexi glass sculpture seemingly hidden in the corner, yet as an obstacle, entitled Time Arc, 2016, refers to Senstad's ongoing work with semi transparent and translucent materials, the immateriality of light and attempts of solidifying light and unveiling elements of the transparent plane. Light exists as time and science creates arcs in space. Sound operates in arcs as do all wave forms, forces of nature and electronic recordings of the verbalized intent and spoken language. The aesthetic experience of the arc is a pleasant space of contemplation between the line, mathematical ideas of time and the void where the idea of the black hole illuminates the infinitesimal.

In these realms of ideas of the void, two women artists work in multiple complex states, echelons and practices, in each their disciplines, yet across their generations we find an amalgamation of exploration and contemplation, and a humble approach through creative action, an understanding and compassionate thought.

The exhibition examines ways of rethinking the exhibition as industry. It takes place virtually where authorship is shared by social media and websites as a continuous intellectual creative process and the meditative virtual plane when immersed in the experiential. Lastly, it examines the non-objectified space of the void institution (here the case of the Centro Culturale Don Orione Artigianelli). The physical location of this exhibition represents a void space replacing art, housing emptiness. In this manifested emptiness, the displaced art points to the existence of an essence, purity and spirit of the authentic will and the artists labour towards authorship. Today, as a former place of devotion and public service, the corporate art institution and its subjects represent the commerce and capital of culture as a currency of spectacle and the de-sanitized globalization on the individual's ethical compass. The exhibition serves as a staged action and takes on the role of the rogue storyteller and of contradictory histories to be exposed, the displacement of authenticity and oeuvre.

About Anne Katrine Senstad:
Anne Katrine Senstad was educated at Parsons School of Design and The New School for Social Research in New York. Senstad works in the intersections of installation art, photography, video, neon sculptures, landart and site specific work, with a focus on the phenomena of perception, light, sound and color, as well as critical and poetic text based works on dialectics and transformative ideas adressing language, literature and philosophy. The inherent lyricism in her work, creates a bridge between psychological elements, materiality and thematic concerns. In her ongoing field work, she engages in cultural, social and political interactions through active, organic and personal involvement for a wider educational and collaborative platform between diverse ideologies, developing a new folklore and amalgamation between post-modern individualism and internationalism.
Notable exhibitions include her controversial In Absentia exhibition Topologies for a Vertical Sound with C.C. Hennix displaced from the voided Centro Culturale Don Orione Artigianelli during the 57th Venice Biennale, a one person exhibition at El Magazen Dell'Arte during the 56th Venice Biennale, and at Officina Delle Zattere , Collaterali Eventi 55th Venice Biennale. In 2015 she produced a 90 ft long text based LED sculpture commissioned by the Bruges Art and Architecture Triennale in Belgium entitled Gold Guides Me(Capitalism in the Public Realm). In 2010 she created a 1,5 acre agricultural landart sculpture in collaboration with a Louisiana farmer entitled The Sugarcane Labyrinth. In 2011 she completed a major public art commission in collaboration with the internationally renowned architecture firm Snøhetta, at The Wolfe Center for the Arts, Ohio which consisted of a 28x86 ft mural for the lobby based on her post minimalist photographic works.
Future rojects and exhibitions include a commissioned public art light sculpture for the Bruges public Library in Belgium with Studio Farris Architects to be unveiled October 2017, and in February 2017 Senstad launched a cross cultural womens platform entitled Time Beyond Place – The Cultural Bridge with King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture in Saudi Arabia that was spearheaded by Senstad in 2016 with CULTURUNNERS and will exist as an open collaborative initiative.

About Catherine Christer Hennix, composer:
Catherine C Hennix (1948) was among the pioneers in Sweden experimenting with main-frame computer generated composite sound wave forms in the late '60s (Still Life, Q*: Fylkingen Records, 1970 (vinyl), 2004 (cd)). In the '70s she led the just intonation live-electronic ensembles Hilbert Hotel and The Deontic Miracle. In 1978 Henry Flynt formulated what, subsequently, became known as the concept of an Illuminatory Sound Environment (ISE) on the basis of Hennix' performance of The Electric Harpsichord at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm,1976 (released by Die Schachtel, Milano, 2010). For the next 20 years Hennix devoted much of her time to mathematical research at the insistence of her late Nada Guru, Sri Faquir Pandit Pran Nath, serving as a professor of mathematics and computer science and assistant to and coauthor with A.S. Yessenin-Volpin for which she was given the Centenary Prize-fellow Award (2000) by the Clay Mathematics Institute, Cambridge, USA. In 2003 she returned to computer generated composite sound wave forms now called Soliton(e)s of which Soliton(e) Star was the first result. Subsequently she formed the just intonation ensemble The Choras(s)an Time-Court Mirage which performs Blues Dhikir al- Salam (Live at the Grimmuseum, vol. 1, Berlin, 2011, Important Records 2012). In 2012 Hennix realized a 4-channel composition, Rag Infinity/Rag Cosmosis, her first 4- channel computer assisted composition since 1969. A beta-version has been made available for the ZKM Subraum installation. The world premiere, version 1.0, took place at the Project Room, Brooklyn, NY, in June 2013. This is Hennix ́most complex electronic composition since returning to the avant-garde music scene - so far. In April 2014 Hennix returned to the Issue Project Room with her ensemble Choras(s)an Time-Court Mirage performing Blues Alif Lam Mim. Senstad and Hennix have collaborated on multiple exhibitions and installations internationally.