2015 Tag

Erin Gee - Larynx Series

Larynx Series

Larynx1, Larynx2, Larynx3, Larynx4 (2014)
Epson UltraChrome K3 ink on acid-free paper.
Edition of 5.
86 x 112 cm.

2014

What we consider our voice in a technologically mediated environment is a visual-vocal-technological assemblage that implicates amplification, scale, human and digital bodies and networks. The multiplication and proliferation of voice on someone else’s device happens in asynchronous ways, much the same as a vocal score is a vocal performance that lay crystalized and dormant until activated by human action.

This series of printed works is a set of vocal quartets created from the original material of the human voice, the larynx, which was amplified/reproduced/echoed through visual perception processes in machine and human cognizers and re-performed by multiple human singers. In endoscopic photography the flesh material of the larynx is extended through the sensory mechanisms of a machine. Light bounces off the flesh of the larynx and is interpreted by a camera as pixel data. This digital image is made of raster pixels faithful to their fleshy origins but limited in detail. If one amplifies the raster image of the voice (zoom) the image reveals its materiality as a technical assemblage. I transformed the raster image into a vector in order to continue playing with bouncing machine processes off one another to “voice” how a machine might perceive this human larynx. While the rasterization process I used eliminated the fleshy details of the original larynx, the image emphasized original architectural structures of the larynx, which now more closely resembled a topographical map, or circuit board. This technologically processed version of the larynx could be infinitely amplified or diminished without loss or distortion. At this point I detected an unexpected feature: my associative, human perception could see markings that resembled Western notation at the edges of this transformed image of the human voice, complete with staves, bar lines and notes. My transcription process included dividing each bar into four equal parts, and then transcribing rhythms in a linear relationship to where the small note-like marks were present horizontally in common 4/4 time.  Pitches were interpreted as they appeared vertically on the abstracted staves.

Since there exist four sides to each two-dimensional image, there were four staves for each representation of the larynx in the series. I set this music into four separate vocal partitions for choral song: returning this technologically amplified process of voicing back into multiple human throats.

Exhibition/Performance history

MacKenzie Art Gallery January 2020.

Toronto Bienniale November 2019.

Vocales Digitales – Solo exhibition. March 26 – May 14 2016, Hamilton Artists’ Inc.: Hamilton, Canada. Curated by Caitlin Sutherland.

Rhubarb, rhubarb, peas and carrots, 2015. Dunlop Art Gallery. Regina, Canada. Curated by Blair Fornwald. Larynx Songs premiered with singers Erin Gee, Carrie Smith, Kristen Smith, and Kaitlin Semple.

(Premiere Performance) Rhubarb, Rhubarb, peas and carrots. July 17-September 5, 2015. Dunlop Art Gallery: Regina, Canada. Curated by Blair Fornwald.

Erin Gee and Kelly Andres. August 25 – October 24, 2014. Cirque du Soleil Headquarters: Montreal, Canada. Curated by Eliane Elbogen.

Voice of Echo (Solo Exhibition), 2014. Gallerywest. Toronto, Canada. Curated by Evan Tyler.

(Performance) Tellings: A Posthuman Vocal Concert. Toronto Biennial. Curated by Myung-Sun Kim and Maiko Tanaka.

Collections

Larynx3 (edition 1/5) was purchased by the Saskatchewan Arts Board for their permanent collection in 2019.

Gallery

Photo Credits
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Erin Gee - Swarming Emotional Pianos

Swarming Emotional Pianos

Swarming Emotional Pianos (2012 – ongoing)
Aluminium tubes, servo motors, custom mallets, Arduino-based electronics, iCreate platforms
Approximately 27” x 12” x 12” each

2012

A looming projection of a human performer surrounded by six musical chime robots: their music is driven by the shifting rhythms of the performer’s emotional body, transformed into data and signal that activates the motors of the ensemble.

Swarming Emotional Pianos is a robotic installation work that features performance documentation of an actress moving through extreme emotions in five minute intervals. During these timed performances of extreme surprise, anger, fear, sadness, sexual arousal, and joy, Gee used her own custom-built biosensors to capture the way that each emotion affects the heartbeat, sweat, and respiration of the actress. The data from this session drives the musical outbursts of the robotics surrounding the video documentation of the emotional session. Visitors to this work are presented with two windows into the emotional state of the actress: both through a large projection of her face, paired with stereo recording of her breath and sounds of the emotional session, and through the normally inaccessible emotional world of physiology, the physicality of sensation as represented by the six robotic chimes.

Micro bursts of emotional sentiment are amplified by the robots, providing an intimate and abstract soundtrack for this “emotional movie”. These mechanistic, physiological effects of emotion drive the robotics, illustrating the physicality and automation of human emotion. By displaying both of these perspectives on human emotion simultaneously, I am interested in how the rhythmic pulsing of the robotic bodies confirm or deny the visibility and performativity of the face. Does emotion therefore lie within the visibility of facial expression, or in the patterns of bodily sensation in her body? Is the actor sincere in her performance if the emotion is felt as opposed to displayed?

Custom open-source biosensors that collect heartrate and signal amplitude, respiration amplitude and rate, and galvanic skin response (sweat) have been in development by Gee since 2012.  Click here to access her GitHub page if you would like to try the technology for yourself, or contribute to the research.

Credits

Thank you to the following for your contributions:

In loving memory of Martin Peach (my robot teacher) – Sébastien Roy (lighting circuitry) – Peter van Haaften (tools for algorithmic composition in Max/MSP) – Grégory Perrin (Electronics Assistant)

Jason Leith, Vivian Li, Mark Lowe, Simone Pitot, Matt Risk, and Tristan Stevans for their dedicated help in the studio

Concordia University, the MARCS Institute at the University of Western Sydney, Innovations en Concert Montréal, Conseil des Arts de Montréal, Thought Technology, and AD Instruments for their support.

Videos

Swarming Emotional Pianos (2012-2014)
Machine demonstration March 2014 – Eastern Bloc Lab Residency, Montréal

Swarming Emotional Pianos (2012-2014)
Machine demonstration March 2014 – Eastern Bloc Lab Residency, Montréal

Gallery

Swarming Emotional Pianos

Erin Gee - Vocaloid Gig At Nocturne (X + 1)

Gig Vocaloid

Gig Vocaloid (2015)
Vocaloid Gig At Nocturne (X + 1)

2015

A video-text pop band from a dystopic future where the human voice is lost and pop music reigns supreme.

Virtual voices are key for these pop stars. Dancing, costumed performers carry tablets that display the human larynx and song lyrics as they dance in sync.

The project is inspired by virtual pop stars such as Hatsune Miku, which exist equally as distributed visual media avatar (holograms, merchandise), and as digital software tools for public, fan-based synthesized vocal creation. GIG VOCALOID is also inspired by boy and girl pop bands, whereupon individual voices and musicality are often superseded by a pop “character.” This is especially true in Japanese pop group AKB48, which has 48 female members whom are voted upon by the public for the right to solo singing and “leadership” within the group.

In this pop music context, celebrity character, fashion and visual appeal is more important than the human singing voice itself, which is often replaced by synthesizers and pitch correction. GIG VOCALOID invokes a fantasy posthumanist future where the human voice is lost, subjectivity is dead, and everyone is celebrating.

Externalizing the human voice outside of the preciousness of the human body, the human larynx (typically a hidden, interior aspect of vocal performance) is displayed prominently on tablets. “Lyrics” to their song flash aleatorically through these videos, which enable humans performers to be the support for digital artwork. GIG VOCALOID re-localizates the voice beyond the borders of the flesh body in an infectious avatar-dream.

Performance history

GIG VOCALOID is a virtual pop band that had its first performance at the Musée d’art Contemporain de Montreal in February 2015 at X + 1: an evening of Internet-inspired art.

Gallery

Gig Vocaloid (2015)
Vocaloid Gig At Nocturne (X + 1)

Erin Gee - Rhubarb, rhubarb, peas and carrots

Rhubarb, rhubarb, peas and carrots

Rhubarb, rhubarb, peas and carrots, Dunlop Art Gallery (Regina SK), July 17-September 5, 2015. Review in National Gallery of Canada Magazine

Erin Gee at Flesh of the World - Photo by Myfanwy Ashmore

Flesh of the World

Erin Gee - Vocaloid Gig At Nocturne (X + 1)

Nocturne (x + 1)

Nocturne (x + 1) at Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal // February 20th, 2015. Reviews and interviews at Creator’s Project: Spend a Night at the Museum, Surrounded by Digital Art and BOOOOOOOM magazine.

“X+1 at Musée d’Art Contemporain de Montréal. For the next Nocturne du Mac (Friday February 20) :

X+1 unfurls the universe and aesthetics of net art and web culture. For this Nocturne evening, the walls of the circular architectural space of the Rotonde will be enlivened and filled with a profusion of images. Networking and exchange activities, along with many different creations by local and international artists, will merge together before being retranscribed in a unique, immersive, visual experience.

The originators of the project⎯Erin Gee, Benoit Palop, Sabrina Ratté and Tristan Stevens⎯have invited artists from their personal networks who, in turn, have each invited another artist, a method of selection that emphasizes URL social activities and the open source, exponential nature of creation in the Internet age: hence the designator X+1.

As part of this event, Sabrina Ratté and Roger Tellier-Craig will put on an audiovisual performance at 8 p.m., which will be followed by a performance by hybrid characters created by Erin Gee. Max D. (Deglazer) will move about the space and project his creations live throughout the evening.”

Participating artists:

Morehshin Allahyari, Anthony Antonellis, LaTurbo Avedon, Jeremy Bailey, Masha Batsea, John Boyle-Singfield, Brenna Murphy & Birch Cooper, Jennifer Chan, Max D. (Deglazer), M. Plummer Fernandez, Adam Ferriss, Carrie Gates, Émilie Gervais, Erin Gee, Claudia Hart, Anna Hawkins, Faith Holland, Zahid Jiwa, Alex M. Lee, Sara Ludy, Claudia Mate, Lorna Mills, Adriana Minolti, Sam Newell, Maryann Norman, Aoto Oouchi, Eva Papamargariti, Lorena Prain, Sabrina Ratté, Rafia Santana, Nicolas Sassoon, Tristan Stevens, Roger Tellier-Craig,  Josh Tonies, Reid Urban and Krist Wood.

View the Press Release

GIFs to Have Sex By

GIFs to Have Sex By, curated by Faith Holland at Transfer Gallery NYC and Digital Sweat Gallery (online), July 11-25, 2015.

(From Creators Project)

Faith Holland takes over Brooklyn-based Transfer Gallery through the end of this month, with an unexpected extension of her Technophilia exhibition—a compilation of GIFs, each by a different artist, entitled, GIFs to Have Sex By—appearing as a one-night-only screening and performance July 11. Soliciting pieces from more than 40 prolific media artists, Holland brings a participative and social aspect to the show, one that reflects on open and networked internet-era creative practices. She asked the artists to not specifically go for sexual explicit content, but instead encouraged a creative freedom and flexibility that ended-up subtly depicting the main theme.

GIFs to Have Sex By’s full lineup includes:

Morehshin Allahyari, Alma Alloro, Anthony Antonellis, Andrew Benson, Gaby Cepeda, Oliver David, Mark Dorf, Adam Ferriss, Dafna Ganani, Carla Gannis, Carrie Gates, Erin Gee, Emilie Gervais, Jeremy Haik, Claudia Hart, Tycho Horan, Georges Jacotey, Daniel Johnson, Nicole Killian, Michelle Leftheris, Rollin Leonard, Rea McNamara, Michael Mallis, Rosa Menkman, A Bill Miller, Lorna Mills, Adriana Minoliti, Paula Nacif, Eva Papamargariti, Christian Petersen, Antonio Roberts, Sam Rolfes, Rafia Santana, Talia Shulze, Yoshi Sodeoka, Miyö Van Stenis, Tristan Stevens, Katie Torn, V5MT, Angela Washko, and Giselle Zatonyl.

Read the reviews on The Creator’s Project, AQNB, Dazed, ArtFCity, and Flavorwire.  Also featured in “The Agenda: This Week in New York”, in Art in America, but the link is broken now, sorry!