Chromoson
chromo[kroh-moh] chromo…,colo(u)r-…son2[suhn] M sound, noise.
AN IMMERSIVE PERFORMANCE INSPIRED BY THE MULTI-SENSORY PHENOMENON OF SYNAESTHESIA

For one night only, Delmar Gallery in Ashfield will be transformed into an experimental realm of colour, sound and light.

Composer and electronic musician, Fiona Hill, is collaborating with multimedia artist, Samantha Mitchell-Fin and soprano Belinda Montgomery, in an immersive performance fusing colour and sound to simulate a synaesthetic experience.

Synaesthesia is an intriguing condition, where one of the senses crosses over into the realm of another. A synaesthete may see a number as a particular colour, or have a distinct taste in their mouth when they hear a certain type of music.

Isaac Newton, for example, heard the musical pitch ‘C’ when he saw the colour red. Kandinsky famously painted synaesthetic compositions, transferring music into colour.

For those of us who don’t hear colours or see music, this performance will bring it tantalisingly close.  The audience will be swathed in light and music, with surround sound and visuals transmitted through 5 projectors and 8 speakers.

Subwoofers will heighten the sonic effect, so that the soundwaves can be felt through the body. On arrival, audience members will be invited to don white lab coats, and during the performance images will be projected onto them so that they FEEL the light as well as the sound.

The project will be run from the platform of Max/MSP/Jitter, which allows for the real-time processing of sound and visuals. Because of this real-time ability parts of the performance will be improvised so the sound and visuals will be reacting off each other and thus fully integrated. The soprano voice will also feature in this improvised section and will be processed through various effects in real-time.

CHROMOSON
Presented by Trinity Grammar School’s Society of the Arts
Sound and Music by Fiona Hill
Images by Samantha Mitchell-Fin
Vocals by Belinda Montgomery

When:           7pm for 7.30pm, Thursday 4th November
Where:          Delmar Gallery, Trinity Grammar School, 144 Victoria Street, Ashfield
Contact:        Catherine Benz, Convenor, Society of the Arts, p.02 9581 6070, cbenz@trinity.nsw.edu.au
Tickets:        $25 on the Door. Bookings Essential

About the artists
Fiona Hill is currently composer-in-residence at Trinity Grammar School. Growing up wedged between factories and forest, it this space she intends to fill compositionally. A common theme in her electroacoustic work is the sourcing of sounds from nature and industrial environments and blending these in a musical space incorporating acoustic instruments, live performers and spatialised sonic environments. Hill holds a Masters in Screen Composition and a Bachelor of Music in Piano Performance. She composed for the short dance film ╢Entanglement Theoryâ•˙, premiering at Dance on Film in New York 2009 and ╢Zephyr String Quartetâ•˙s’ WIRED project 2008. As a pianist Hill has played extensively with tango band Quartito Azul and contemporary improvisation ensemble MIRRA.

Samantha Mitchell-Fin is an artist working with light-based installation, photography and film. She is currently completing a Masters of Fine Arts at Sydney College of the Arts. Her interest is in the capture of light and colour, experimenting with the phenomenology of light. She is interested in the sublime responses to light, in particular the imperfections in the pure hue. Where possible, she uses minimal digital enhancement, choosing to manipulate the light and colour without digital interference. Mitchell-Fin is also the director of Kaleidoscope Gallery in Paddington.

This is their first collaborative work.

How did this project use Max?

This project incorporates a Max patch to run multiple projections and 10 channel sound in a spatialised environment. It allows for user manipulation of synthesised sounds as well as filtering of live vocals. User manipulation of video material is also incorporated into the patch.