sonic translations of sol lewitt’s wall drawing #260
Variation #2:
Variation #3:
In 2011 Sebastien Roux began to develop an approach focused on principles of translation, analyzing the structures of pre-existing art works (visual, musical, literary) and transposing them into scores for new works (radiophonic or electro-acoustic taped music). This process has led to the creation of: Quatuor (2011) an electroacoustic work based on Beethoven’s 10th String quartet, commissioned by Groupe de Recherches Musicales (GRM, Paris) and Nouvelle (2012) a radio work, based on Flaubert’s short story The Legend of Saint Julien L’Hospitalier, commissioned by the Westdeutscher Rundfunk (WDR, Cologne).
The american artist Sol Lewitt created more than 1200 wall drawings between 1968 and 2007. Each drawing is produced through a series of instructions created by the artist, the execution of which are performed by a team of draftspeople. Composer Alvin Lucier makes an analogy between Sol Lewitt’s work and that of musical writing, in that the artist formulates an ensemble of parameters (a score) that is then interpreted by his assistants (musicians) in order to be viewed (heard) by an audience.
Inevitable Music (which received its initial support from the Institut Français) has involved an exhaustive research on the wall drawings of Sol Lewitt (especially at DIA Beacon, and Mass Moca, North Adams), and a long-term examination and development of a methodology for applying the rules and means of these works to sonic ends (sound installations, listening sessions, radio pieces).
Inevitable Music #1 is a collection of sonic translations of Sol LeWitt’s WD #260, employing a group of discrete digital and analog sounds (sustained/pulsed sine tone, sawtooth wave, voice, etc.) that each correspond to one of 20 shapes used in creating LeWitt’s instructional wall drawing. Once assigned, these discrete sounds combine to create elegant and rigorous compositions that encourage the listener to reconsider LeWitt’s notion that “the idea becomes a machine that makes the art.”1 As a further nod to the instructional nature of LeWitt’s practice, each variation is preceded by a female voice that announces the particular combination of sounds used to create the composition.
As Seth Cluett remarks in his essay for this release, “The result of Roux’s mapping of line drawing instructions onto auditory raw materials…creates a productive tension between listening and material, process and narrative, and ultimately between the elapsed experience of time and the successive filling of auditory space.”
Roux has performed versions of Inevitable Music over the last several years, including performances at Issue Project Room, Brooklyn, the Akousma Festival, Montreal and Cafe Oto, London, Pompidou Metz, and most recently at Huddersfield’s Electric Spring Festival.
