“MICROSACCADES NO.2”

Black Zenith with Brian O’Reilly (Ireland/USA) and Darren Moore (Australia)
Analog modular synthesizers & moving images

A saccade is a fast movement of an eye, or It can also be a fast shift in frequency of an emitted signal or other quick change. Saccades are quick, simultaneous movements of both eyes in the same direction. Initiated by eye fields in the frontal and parietal lobes of the brain, saccades serve as a mechanism for fixation, rapid eye movement and the fast phase of optokinetic nystagmus (a form of involuntary eye movement).

“Microsaccades no.2” exploits the properties produced by bombarding CTR displays with analog visual patterns and shifting video fields. The visualizations are produced in real time, with the flickering images being created by directly responding to the influence of
frequencies applied to the video’s Red, Green and Blue components. It utilizes a device that transforms the analog audio signals into a video signal, creating a mapping of sounds which modulate each of the primary color channels of the video signal.

Black Zenith with Brian O’Reilly and Darren Moore

Black Zenith is Brian O’Reilly Darren Moore. The duo performs using analog modular synthesizers & moving images. They produce dense sonic textures that generate live visuals through the transformation of audio signals into images. Black Zenith draws as much influence from noise music & the electroacoustic music tradition as they do from the foundations of abstract video art. Black Zenith is focused on researching the intersecting points between electroacoustic music, improvisation and experimental video art. Integral to their research is the exploration of the interface of these elements within live performance. Black Zenith investigates the symbiotic relationship between sound and image considering each element as of equal importance in the artist output.

“ความมืดสีขาว (Kwaam-muud-siik-khaw) WHITE IN THE DARKNESS”

Koji Tambata (Video, Japan) in collaboration with Yong Yandsen (Improvised tenor sax, Malaysia)

Juxtaposing images in concerning music as movements like cubists such as Picasso or Braque.Emphasizing colors like fauvist such as Matisse. To get organic movements and to reach the final result with process as the abstract expressionists, like Pollock. Aware of the medium itself as the avant-garde filmmakers, like Conrad or Kubelka. Love for aphorism as human tendency like filmmaker Godard. All are going toward natural growth in respect of Taoism or Zen Buddhism.

This collaboration is going to be the second trial with music improviser, Yandsen Yong, who has the intensity and lyricism like Kaoru Abe. After deconstruction by video editing, there is a kind of reality in fragments of Yandsen’s playing appearing like geologic stratum. The past images have some kind of intensity which cannot be created anymore as the same as the present images. It is precious in this manner. And new images will be appearing from ‘between the past and now’.

Title ความมืดสีขาว (Kwaam-muud-siik-khaw) in Thai, White In The Darkness in English is a Zen Buddhism phrase which means “knowledge that cannot stop suffering and greed”. Blocking the eyes and the heart to see and to understand it, one cannot reach enlightenment. This awareness will continue into the emptiness.

Koji Tambata

Koji Tambata is a video artist with a deep interest in film, music, performance and philosophy. He gained a Bachelor of Art in Media Study at SUNY Buffalo, and his Master of Fine Art in Electronic Integrated Arts at Alfred University. He has lived in USA for about 10 years. During his stay in Buffalo, New York, he was known as “the musician who plays the video camera” in the art circle and he was always seen videotaping musicians at concerts. Koji has produced a series of solo multimedia concerts called “Music Works” since 1996 with live video, video installation, improvised and free jazz music and performance. He has participated in various festivals and events including In/Beyond Western New York, Notthatbalai Art Festival (Malaysia), (E)merging: Western and Southern New York Media Art Exhibition, CLICK! Buffalo, Artists & Models amongst others. He has collaborated with Kok Siew Wai, Yong Yandsen, Tony Conrad, Steve Baczkowski, Jonathan Galove, Hylozoa, Eliav Brand, King Sunshine, Knowmatic Tribe Sound System and more. Koji is currently living in Thailand.

Yandsen Yong

Yandsen Yong plays the saxophones, clarinet and flute. Yandsen was the veteran lead vocal and band leader of rock band Moxuan in late 1990s. He then ventures into a new direction in music – free jazz and improvised music. Yandsen is the woodwind player of Klangmutationen, where it has released albums through Utech Records (USA) and Dream Sheep (Italy). Yandsen has collaborated with various artists and musicians including Goh Lee Kwang, Ng Chor-Guan, Kok Siew Wai, Darren Moore, Brian O’ Reily, Thierry Monnier, Uchihashi Kazuhisa, Damo Suzuki, Abang Guard and more. He has played in the Kuala Lumpur Contemporary Music Festival, Mosaic Festival Singapore, Choppa Eclectic Improvised Music Festival (Singapore) amongst others. Yandsen is a member of the Experimental Musicians & Artists Cooperative Malaysia (EMACM), co-founder of Studio in Cheras, Kuala Lumpur (SiCKL), and co-director of Sama-sama Guesthouse Mini Alternative Art Festival.

“WITHIN THE UNCOMPREHENDED PASSAGE OF TIME”

Behrooz Zandi Tavassol (Tar & Video, Iran) with Mostafa Mahmoudi (Video, Iran)

In this performance piece, I’ll play a Persian instrument called Tar, with a background music track of my composition. It’ll be accompanied by a short video that I’ve created specifically for this audio-visual performance.

Behrooz Zandi Tavassol

Behrooz Zandi Tavassol was born in Tehran, Iran 1989. I entered the music school of Tehran at the age of 11, and graduated 8 years later with a Diploma in Persian traditional music. Meanwhile, I focused on classical and modern composition, Playing the Piano and Oud, devoting my whole teenage life to Music. After graduating from Music high school, I left home to pursue my studies in other fields of arts In Malaysia at the Multimedia University, taking Animation courses in the Faculty of Creative Multimedia (FCM). I hope to expand my understanding of art not only musically, but also visually. Meanwhile, I pursue my musical activities by working with Persian traditional bands, as well as experiencing Rock and Experimental music. I am currently in my third year student in FCM.

“Sound & Visual Experimentation”

Jazmok + Cheese (laptop and electronics, Malaysia) with Azmyl Yunor (guitar, Malaysia)

Jazmok + Cheese (jazmok-and-cheese) is a collaborative performance in experimenting sound and visual art. Focus on local cultural visual elements and music instruments to be presented in a form of new media. Vision of this collaboration is to re-imagine multimedia performance and encourage enhancement discovery in psychology, science, art, and engineering.

Jazmok + Cheese

Jazmok is a musician who likes exploring mixture of electronic and traditional music instrument on computer. He improvises the music arrangement to create energetic and natural sound vibe.

Cheese is a visual artist who loves to experiment with lines, shapes, geometric, and colours during the performance. Also, he mixed his artwork with photographic scenery from interesting spaces.

Azmyl Yunor

One of the hardest gigging Malaysian indie/underground musicians for the past decade, Azmyl Yunor is also dubbed the “Malaysian Bob Dylan” by peers. A former street musician, he has performed at festivals and venues in countries around the region and internationally such as Australia, Singapore, South Korea, Indonesia, Japan, Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand. Although largely still unknown to the public (he likes to keep it that way), he is considered one of the pioneers of the now popular acoustic music scene (which now boasts acts like Liyana Fizi and Yuna), promoting the genre tirelessly as co-artistic director of Troubadours Enterprise (along with fellow singer-songwriters Jerome Kugan and Tan Sei Hon), organisers of the annual Malaysian singer-songwriter showcase KL Sing Song from 2005 to 2009.

Continuing to tour locally and internationally in 2010 and 2011 (he is the first Malaysian indie folk artist to appear on Indonesian national television station TransTV in January) to promote his new album “Warga” (released May 2010), he is currently in the midst of
recording 2 full-length albums to follow up, one with his touring band The Sigarettes. Uncommon for most underground musicians, he has also shared the stage with mainstream icons such as M. Nasir, Khatijah Ibrahim, and Man Bai, and also plays harmonica in veteran singer songwriter Dr. Wan Zawawi’s band.