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Lateral audio
Lateral was made as a live, site-specific installation set in Dixon Street, Glasgow. The work was commissioned and created for High-Slack-Low-Slack-High – a suite of audio works relating to the Clyde River curated by Minty Donald for GI Festival of Visual Art. Subsequent to that event I created a studio version of Lateral, which is now available at Bandcamp.
Lateral
Originally commissioned and created for High-Slack-Low-Slack-High – a suite of audio works relating to the Clyde River curated by Minty Donald for GI Festival of Visual Art – Lateral was made as a live, site-specific installation set in Dixon Street, Glasgow. Subsequent to that event I created a studio version of the work.
Background info
Dixon Street is a main thoroughfare that runs from the river directly up through the city’s main shopping artery. The aims of the work were to highlight a sense of disconnection from the river and to create multiple cross currents by merging the river sounds of Lateral and the sounds of the city environment. The work was projected over large horn speakers mounted in the street between two buildings, creating a view down to the river. Six vocalists added a further layer of human presence with their resonant tones both emerging out of and being subsumed by the undulating sound density of the site.
The starting point for the work was the idea of a ‘Lateral System’ – a system of navigational aids comprising shapes, colours and numbers, used to guide boats up river channels into ports and docks. However, the multiple resonances of the word ‘lateral’ took on greater significance in the work through the associations and digressions that emerge with the notion of a flowing river. Place names, numerical information from tidal charts and signal/radio sounds serve as signposts along the way, rooting the work in a real world place. But the perpetual flow of water and the periodic rhythms of a vocal landscape contribute to a sense of multiple spatial and historical resonances, and to ideas of flowing with and against the current.
Many thanks indeed to Claire Docherty, Kirstie Edgar, Jessica King, Morag Stark and Hanna Tuulikki for their live vocal contributions both on site at Dixon Street and at the closing event in the Clydeport Authority Headquarters.
Performances/events include…
2016
‘Inter-#6’ (Glasgow)
Curated radio show ‘Glasgow Soundscapes’ WebSynRadio (France)
2015
Curated listening hour at Brooklyn Acoustic Ecology Festival (US)
LOLG project Shona Island (Scotland)
2014
(25 Feb – 2 March)
Here. now. where? Saout Radio, 5th Marrakech Biennale
(12 – 18 January)
Framework Radio broadcasts
12th london, uk ::: resonance 104.4fm
13th amsterdam, nl ::: concertzender
13th vancouver, us ::: radio nouspace
14th south devon, uk ::: soundartradio 102.5fm
14th maribor, si ::: radio marš 95.9fm
15th lisbon, pt ::: radio zero
15th vancouver, us ::: radio nouspace
16th coimbra, pt ::: rádio universidade de coimbra 107.9fm
16th lisbon, pt ::: radio zero
17th ljubljana, si ::: radio študent 89.3fm
17th brussels, be ::: radio campus 92.1fm
17th vancouver, us ::: radio nouspace
18th london, uk ::: resonance 104.4fm
18th new york state, us ::: wgxc 90.7fm
18th brasilía, br ::: rádio paisagem
2012
Foldover, WOBC 91.5 fm, Ohio
Time/Zones, Akademie der Kunst, Berlin
AIR/EAR Installation, Radio-System, Argentine
High-Slack-Low-Slack-High, GI Festival, Dixon Street, Glasgow
High-Slack-Low-Slack-High, GI Festival, Clydeport HQ, Glasgow
Lateral at High-Slack-Low-Slack-High
My work Lateral was commissioned for High-Slack-Low-Slack-High curated by Minty Donald for Glasgow International Festival of Visual Art in April 2012. For more information and performance times visit Glasgow International Festival of Visual Art and also the Facebook page High-Slack-Low-Slack-High.
About High-Slack-Low-Slack-High
Commissioned Artists: John Cavanagh, Minty Donald/Nick Miller, Douglas Morland, Nichola Scrutton, Hanna Tuulikki
A group of artists with shared, but diverse, interests in sound, space and place – have created audio works to be performed in public spaces close to or on the River Clyde over five days during the Festival (Monday 23rd – Friday 27th April 2012). Each performance is timed to coincide with high tide. In these citywide performances, the natural cadences and flux of the river, once significant in the tempo of Glasgow life, will again leak into the urban fabric.
On Saturday 28th April, all five works will be performed in the Trust Hall of Clydeport Authority Headquarters, an opulent, circular, Edwardian boardroom overlooking the Clyde. Here, the sonic interpretations of the river’s tidal cycle will permeate a building that stands as symbol of Glasgow’s maritime heritage.
‘High-Slack-Low-Slack-High reflects on the functional and symbolic roles played by urban rivers in contemporary cities – and in particular, the role of the River Clyde in Glasgow today. It’s common belief that, following the decline of shipbuilding and other maritime industries, Glasgow turned its back on the River. Now, while the riverbanks are undergoing significant regeneration, the water itself remains a relatively dead space. Through interweaving the natural cadences of the tide with contemporary urban rhythms, High-Slack-Low-Slack-High is an invitation to re-imagine the relationship between river and city – beyond the legacy of Glasgow’s industrial and manufacturing past.’
Perpetually rising and falling yet constrained within manmade embankments, detached from the city that once saw it as symbolic of its industrial prowess, the tidal river is taken as an invitation to reflect on ideas of change and continuity, nature and culture, in relation to the contemporary, post-industrial city.
(press written by Minty Donald)
Performances
23 April – Hanna Tuulikki, Bell’s Bridge, G51 – 3.15pm
24 April – John Cavanagh – Riverside Museum, G3 8RS – 3.45pm
25 April – Nichola Scrutton – Dixon Street, G1 4AL – 4.05pm
26 April – Douglas Morland – Clyde north waterfront between Victoria and Glasgow Bridges, G5 – 4.45pm
27 April – Minty Donald/Nick Millar – citywide – 5.25pm (and throughout the week)
28 April – 5pm and 7.30pm – Clydeport Authority Headquarters
