In October 1966, Experiments in Art and Technology (E.A.T.) presented a series of artists’ performances ‘9 EVENINGS: THEATRE & ENGINEERING’, at the 69th Regiment Armory in New York City. Raw documentary film and sound material from 9 Evenings in the E.A.T.s archives for more than thirty years has been used to make films on video that reconstruct each of the ten artists’ performances as faithfully as the material permits and with added documentary sections featuring interviews with artists and engineers on the artistic and technical elements in the work.
9 Evenings films Produced 1996- 2017
Directed by Barbro Schultz Lundestam and Julie Martin. Edited by Barbro Schultz Lundestam, Julie Martin and Ken Weissman. Produced by Billy Klüver and Julie Martin for Experiments in Art and Technology
SCREENING DETAILS / TUESDAYS, 1PM, LECTURE ROOM
Tuesday 12 December / 1pm / Lecture Room – Drop In / Double Bill
Grass Field by Alex Hay
Alex Hay wore a backpack of specially designed differential amplifiers with a peak gain at low frequencies of 80 db and FM transmitters that picked up brain waves, muscle activity, and eye movement from electrodes placed on Alex’s head and body. These sounds were broadcast to the audience as Alex carefully laid out 64 numbered pieces of cloth. Then he sat facing the audience, with his face being projected on a large screen behind him while two performers, Steve Paxton and Robert Rauschenberg, systematically picked up the pieces of cloth.
Performance Engineer: Bob Kieronski Performed 13 and 22 October 1966.
Physical Things by Steve Paxton
Steve Paxton constructed a large inflated structure of polyethylene consisting of large dome-shaped rooms connected by tunnels. The audience walked through this structure, viewing slides and live activities. Speakers fed by loop tape recorders played low level sounds. Rising above the last room was a 100 foot high tower with white noise pouring down from above. As they exited from this room, the visitors were given small electronic units consisting of an amplifier, speaker and magnetic pickup of the kind used to pick up conversations from telephone receivers. Twenty wire loops, 8 feet in diameter were fastened to a fish net rigged above the heads of the audience, each one connected directly to a tape recorder. The audio signals from the tape recorders induced a magnetic field in the wire loops which could be picked up and converted to sound by the unit the visitors were holding to their ears, so they could walk around listening to music, screaming jungle birds, man discoursing on fishing, etc.
Performance Engineer: Dick Wolff Performed 13 and 19 October 13 1966.
Details of further screenings taking place from January 2018 can be found at http://www.imma.ie/en/page_237280.htm
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