Erin Gee Tag

AFFECT FLOW

AFFECT FLOW (2022)
Performance at MUTEK Montreal 2023. Photography by Vivien Gaumand.

2022

AFFECT FLOW is a music performance work of approximately 30 minutes that initiates listeners into a state of “non-naturalist emotion”: emotional manufacture as a technology for survival or pleasure. It is a hybrid of electroacoustic music with live-spoken verbal suggestion, an ensemble of live biofeedback created by hardware synthesisers, and song.

In AFFECT FLOW I use psychological hacks borrowed from method acting and clinical psychology in order to move beyond “natural” emotion, playing with biofeedback music paradigms and group participation through folk hypnosis, verbal suggestion, clinical psychology methods, roleplay, song, and textural sounds.

These performance techniques, which I call “wetware,” challenge the authoritarian aura of quantification, transforming biofeedback into a feminist space of posthumanist connection and expression.

The biofeedback performers (up to 10) in AFFECT FLOW are volunteers referred to as surrogates who meet me a half hour before the performance. After a brief musical interlude, I extend an invitation for the audience to join us in guided visualization and hypnosis led by me and my voice. Each surrogate operates a BioSynth, a musical instrument of my design that responds to physiological markers like heart rate, breathing, and skin conductance as a control parameter for electronic sound. The mechanics of the BioSynths are explained clearly, allowing listeners to perceive the shifting mood in the room during the performance through the bodies of the performers. This collaborative interplay of bodies gives rise to affect as an ecological relation, transcending individual subjectivity.

A lightbulb illuminates at the feet of each performer when their signals are amplified. Because I can control the audio outputs of each body via a mixing board, I can highlight solos, duets, trios, and ensemble moments live in the moment.

Credits

Affect Flow (2022)
Music composition and performance by Erin Gee.

Dramaturgy and text by Jena McLean. Poetry by Andrew C. Wenaus.

BioSynth affective hardware synthesizers are an open-source project by Erin Gee. Programming for this iteration by Etienne Montenegro with sonification programming by Erin Gee. PCB design by Grégory Perrin.

Click here for the BioSynth GitHub.

Click here for Tech Rider

Performances:

International Symposium of Electronic Art. CCCB Barcelona, ES, May 2022.

Society for Art and Technology, Montreal CA, July 2022.

Vancouver New Music – Orpheum Annex, Vancouver CA November 2022.

Electric Eclectics Festival, Meaford ON, CA, August 2023

MUTEK Montreal, CA, August 2023.

AFFECT FLOW (2022) at Vancouver New Music, Vancouver.

NOT POMPIDOU – Paris, FR

As part of the 2020 exhibition NEURONS: Simulated Intelligence at Centre Pompidou, Paris, my work as a media artist in AI, affective computing, and interactive sound website was misattributed to American composer and professor at Brandeis University Erin Gee (who shares my name).

While the two Erin Gees have been aware of one another’s practices for several years, (we share many peers who have teased us about our namesakes, and we were even programmed in the same music festival in 2019), to our knowledge our works have never been mixed up or misattributed in a professional capacity.

A public statement was made by the publishers of the catalogue (HYX editions) on their website and as a digital addendum/downloadable pdf, available here.

This post is intended to clarify the following points:

  1. The work that was presented at Centre Pompidou, Shillim: Mouthpiece 34 (2019), is not my work. Mouthpieces is the name of a body of work by homonymous American composer Erin Gee. She is best known for her work in non-semantic vocal music that typically consists of vocal and instrumental compositions, named Mouthpieces with a numerator afterwards. She has been contributing compositions to the Mouthpieces series for over twenty years.
  2. The artworks Machine Unlearning (2020) and Laughing Web Dot Space (2018) referenced in the wall text of the exhibition (see below) and attributed to the American composer are my works. These are new media artworks, incorporating technologies such as neural networks and interactive HTML in their creation. In addition, my work of the soone (2017) attributed to the American composer via the catalogue (see below) is another new media artwork of mine that uses machine learning / AI, and is a collaboration with Canadian media artist Sofian Audry, who is not acknowledged in the catalogue.
  3. As part of the events surrounding the exhibition, American composer Erin Gee was also invited to speak on a panel as part of Forum Vertigo: human and artificial perception dealing with generative music and artificial intelligence.  The opinions expressed and works she references in this panel discussion are entirely her own and are unrelated to my practice.

 

Following the discovery of the misattribution of my work at the exhibition opening (thanks to Parisian peers who were on site), I worked with Robin Dupuis (the Director of the organization perte de signal, which represents my work) to communicate the seriousness of this error to the exhibition’s curators Frédéric Migayrou et Camille Lenglois. Unfortunately, the wall text misattributing my work and research in new media art to American composer Erin Gee remained on the wall of the exhibition for weeks before being replaced by a text that was truly dedicated to the research of the American composer.

In response, the curators of Neurones apologized for these misattribution errors. They expressed that they were unable to do anything further to mitigate the issue of the 200-page catalogue, which also attributed other new media artworks of mine to the American composer who shares my name. During this period I had also reached out to the American artist who was also onsite, however for personal reasons she was not available to respond to the situation for several months.

A photo of original wall text from Neurones exhibition at Centre Pompidou combining the works and research of Canadian Artist Erin Gee with American Composer Erin Gee.

I am very grateful for the assistance of Robin Dupuis at Perte de Signal as well as Editions HYX publishers for working together to create a digital addendum that addresses the error published in the catalogue a month after the error was discovered. It was very pleasant to work with the publishers together on this solution. Despite this, a digital addendum has only a limited impact, as the printed copies remain in circulation without any printed addendum (see below).

I have recently been in touch with American composer Erin Gee to share a horrified laugh and work on solutions – we have both agreed to be diligent and aware of potential confusions this situation might create in the future. We collectively state:  Canadian new media artist Erin Gee is a specialist in affective technologies, emergent technologies such as quantum computing and AI, and vocal performance inspired by ASMR. American composer Erin Gee is a professor at Brandeis University and also an expert in non-semantic vocal performance and composition techniques.

This is of course an imperfect and improvisational solution, as I would never want to prevent a peer from exploring new technology, nor is it logical for me to avoid non-semantic vocal content in future works. Rather, this strategy speaks to a disciplinary situatedness that our sensibilities emerge from. If you are a professional artist or curator working in our fields, please share this story in your network as a means of preventing further confusion. As more peers learn of this issue, as well as our two distinct practices and achievements in our respective fields, we hope that this error will not reproduce itself.

Poster for Akousma 2021

Akousma Montreal

I am thrilled to present the world premiere of my ASMRtronica work We as Waves (2020) as part of the 30th anniversary Akousma Festival in Montreal, Canada.  The programming features an exciting collection of composers that I am happy to be presenting my work alongside.

For more information on the full week of programming and/or to purchase tickets for the festival, click here.

Mélanie Frisoli / Frédéric Auger / Roger-Tellier Craig

Hugo Tremblay / Rouzbeh Shadpey / Erin Gee

– 14 octobre 2021 – USINE C // 7pm

ABOUT AKOUSMA –

Composers Jean-François Denis, Gilles Gobeil, and Robert Normandeau founded Akousma in Montréal in 1991 as a concert production company that showcases works by electroacoustic artists and collectives in Montréal. These works are presented via an immersive sound system, and they take several forms: acousmatic (tape music), mixed (tape and instruments), live (live electronics), video music, or music integrated into other art forms such as dance, performance, or installation.

We as Waves

We as Waves (2021)
Premiere performance at Akousma Festival, Montreal.
Photography by Caroline Campeau.

2020

ASMRtronica is an ongoing project developed in the artist’s home-studio during the novel coronavirus pandemic: a manifestation of a desire for intimacy in sound, when touch was not possible. This is a style of music applied to several works as Gee develops her own vocabularies of psychosomatic performance.

Through ASMRtronica, Gee brings to life a combination of electroacoustic music and the sounds of Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response (ASMR) videos: clicks, whispers, soft spoken voice, taps, and hand gestures inspired by hypnosis, tactility, intimacy, and verbal suggestion. Through ongoing development of this genre, she explores the sonic limits of the sensorial propositions of ASMR, journeying into embodied and unconscious feedback loops in sound.

Credits

We as Waves (2020)
Released August 2021 by Erin Gee.
Music composition and performance by Erin Gee. Text by Jena McLean. Videography by Michel de Silva.

To the Farther (2020)
Released September 8, 2020 by Erin Gee.
Music composition and art by Erin Gee.

We as Waves

We as Waves (2020) is a collaboration between myself and queer playwright Jena McLean. The text in this work is inspired by an essay by feminist theorist of electronic music Tara Rodgers. What does it mean to enter into an affective relationship of touch with sound? The work embodies a dark narrative of sonic becoming aided by hypnosis and physiological relationship to sound and voice, closed by the the following quotes from queer theologist Catherine Keller:

“As the wave rolls into realization, it may with an uncomfortable passion
fold its relations into the future: the relations, the waves of our possibility,
comprise the real potentiality from which we emerge…”

“We are drops of an oceanic impersonality. We arch like waves,
like porpoises.”

We as Waves (2020)

To the Farther

In September 2020 I launched To the Farther as part of MUTEK Montreal’s online exhibition Distant Arcades. It is first a series of music that explore the limits of tactile whispers, proximity, and hypnotic language through ASMR and electronic sound.

To the Farther is the title of the first iteration: A fresh take on texture, form, and the plasticity of reality under digital transformations, also is a “remix” of my ASMR recordings made in Machine Unlearning (2020).

To the Farther (2020)

Audio PlaceboPlaza

Audio Placebo Plaza: Montreal Edition

Poster for Audio Placebo Plaza: Montreal Edition (2021)

2021

In June 2021 the trio transformed a former perfume shop in the St Hubert Plaza of Montreal into a pop up radio station, sensory room, therapist office, and audio production studio, uniting these spaces through the aesthetics of a sandwich shop or cafe to offer customizable audio placebo “specials” and “combos” to the public.

Founded upon principles of feminism, socialism, and audio production excellence, Audio Placebo Plaza invites everyday people to take appointments with artists to discuss how an audio placebo could help improve their lives. These appointments are entirely focused on the individual and are in themselves part of the process. Common topics of discussion included increasing productivity, self-esteem, self-care, social interactivity, brain hacking, mitigating insomnia, and pain management, but also one’s aural preferences, sensitivities, and curiosities. Intake sessions were conducted in a blended telematic/in-person structure to determine one’s familiarity and comfort levels with a variety of psychosomatic audio techniques including but not limited to soundscapes, binaural beats, simulated social interactions, positive affirmations, drone, participatory vocalization, ASMR, guided meditation and deep listening.

After the consultation is complete, team members met to discuss each participant’s case to fulfill their “prescription,” and also to divide the labor amongst the three creators. The collaborations are non-hierarchical, adaptive, and simultaneous: one might be working on up to four projects at a time, or trade tasks depending on one’s backlog of labor. Labor is divided into recording sounds, conducting intake sessions, writing scripts, performing spoken or sung content, writing music, editing and audio mixing, cleaning and maintaining the shared spares, and communicating with visitors or walk-ins.

Audio Placebo Plaza Radio broadcast was facilitated through a pirate radio transmitter as well as an internet radio station. We broadcast completed placebos, shared technical advice and performance practices during informal critiques, work sessions in progress through the DAW, and sometimes informal chats with visitors. Intake sessions were also broadcasted (with the consent of visitors).

Through Audio Placebo Place, we explore and develop methods for sound and music that propose emotional labor, listening, collaboration and “music as repair” (see Suzanne Cusick, 2008) as key elements that shape the sonic-social encounter between artists and the public.

Can placebos help?
Does sound have the power to process complex emotions?
Can music give you what you need?
Is this even music?

Credits

Audio Placebo Plaza is a community sound art project conceived by Julia E Dyck, Erin Gee and Vivian Li .

Graphic design by Sultana Bambino.

Gallery

Photo Credits
Audio Placebo Plaza Poster

Audio Placebo Plaza – Montreal

/Undefine Radio presents a series of radio interventions under the theme of “Bodies in Resonance / Corps Résonants”.

Co-curated by Martín Rodríguez and Emmanuel Madan, this series enlists three successive artist groups to make performances, installations, and engage with the public through the storefront at 6835 Rue Saint-Hubert from June 4 to 22 in Partnership with Suoni per il Popolo and CKUT.

June 11-17: Audio Placebo Plaza

 

Sound artists Erin Gee and Julia E Dyck transform a former perfume shop vitrine into a DIY audio placebo and online radio centre. For one week only they offer everyday people customized positive messages, audio creations, healing frequencies, binaural beats, and ASMR. They are responding to the needs of the community through a practice of radical sonic care.

Can placebos help?
Does sound have the power to process complex emotions?
Can music give you what you need?
Is this even music?

CHECK OUT OUR PIRATE RADIO and INTERNET STREAM —-> undefine.fm

Recto VRso Festival: France

Recto VRso Virtual : April 14-16 2021.  https://rectovrso.laval-virtual.com/

Recto VRso Restitution: July 8-11 2021, Musée Ecole Jardin de la Perrine, Laval (France). 

My ASMRtronica work We as Waves (2021) is part of the 2021 Recto VRso festival

For its upcoming edition, Recto VRso reinvents itself and reshapes its format by combining a virtual exhibition and a restitution in the physical world. The 4th edition of the international digital art festival Recto VRso will take place online from 14th to 16th April 2021 in the virtual world of Laval Virtual World.  A second part of the festival will be organized in a physical space from 7th to 11th July 2021 during the international exhibition Laval Virtual.

Slanted Magazine

My works Machine Unlearning (2020) and Project H.E.A.R.T. (2017) w/ Alex M. Lee are featured in the beautiful German design magazine Slanted #37 – AI!

Slanted Publishers is an internationally active publishing and media house founded in 2014 by Lars Harmsen and Julia Kahl. They publish the award-winning print magazine Slanted, covering international developments in design and culture twice a year.

Out Now:
Slanted Magazine #37–AI

Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) has become—besides being an over-hyped buzzword across industries (that the design world is no exception to)—a reality. The latest issue of Slanted Magazine looks at the impact of artificial intelligence on design and its subsets and highlights how these technologies can change our lives through numerous projects, essays, and interviews. And one more thing: for each cover of the entire edition, a unique motif of CROSSLUCID was printed—an aesthetic between portrait, still life and expressionistic topography, alien to our understanding of the human, the natural, the artificial and the digital …
Slanted Publishers (pub.), 160 × 240 mm, 288 pages, English, Digital Cover Printing (Limego), Offset Printing (Stober Medien), Paper (Fedrigoni), Swiss brochure, ISSN: 1867-6510.

Workshop: ASMR Vocabulary for Composers

Online with Facebook Live
Wednesday, May 26, 2021 at 3 PM EDT
Price: Free
Public Anyone on or off Facebook
Register here: bit.ly/CLC-ASMR
You will receive Zoom login the day of the webinar. Please contact [email protected] if you have any issues.
ASMR (Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response) is a term that refers both to an audiovisual genre that has existed since 2009, and an unconscious, sensory reaction of “phantom touch” an individual might feel in response to soft textural sounds greatly amplified. Focusing on the ways that ASMR sounds “hack” into the subconscious of the listener to create emotional reactions, this seminar introduces audio visual vocabularies through “trigger” techniques, making and breaking patterns, and influences from hypnosis and meditation. ASMR is highly mediated through the camera and microphone, so I will also include these considerations. Through analysis of this genre I invite participants to explore techniques together during the webinar with instruments, voices, or everyday objects.
To learn more about the presenter, visit eringee.net.
*Cet événement sera présenté en anglais, mais les questions en français sont acceptées et encouragées !

Decolonizing the Senses, Roundtable: Montreal

Decolonizing the Senses, Roundtable

Organizer: Florencia Marchetti, CISSC, Concordia University, Canada

This roundtable brings together an interdisciplinary team of Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists and scholars who have been exploring ways of decentering Western notions about the body and the senses through an intercultural research-creation lab since 2014. Through talking and making, thinking, reading and researching, team members have shared and learned about each other’s practices, bringing to the table a diverse range of epistemological and ontological doubts and premises. In this roundtable, we will revisit the project’s trajectory, from our early conversations and interferences to the production of three portable sensory environments and the video re-mediations produced to share the works under the new social regulations imposed by pandemic living.

Discussion topics will include:

– Listening Relationalities

– New Media Art and Indigenous Ontologies

– Creative-Knowledge Flow and Protocols (from Place/Land through Non-Human Ontologies into Artworks)

Panelists:

Jennifer Biddle, National Institute for Experimental Art, University of New South Wales, UK,
David Garneau, Visual Arts, University of Regina, Canada

Erin Gee, Music Composition, Universite de Montreal, Canada
David Howes, Centre for Sensory Studies, Concordia University, Canada
Suzanne Kite, Concordia University, Canada,
Chris Salter, Design Art, Concordia University, Canada,
r e a Saunders, Independent artist, Australia