Reflection matches a series of electro-mechanical bells with a set of distinct, corresponding speakers. Each speaker plays back a reversed recording of a bell, and at the exact moment that the recording ends, the actual bell strikes. This temporal manipulation seamlessly shifts the objects' sound between its material presence and its altered reproduction, resulting in a dialogue of apparent transformation. The immediacy of this interaction is heightened by its spatialization, effectively allowing the listener/viewer to gain entry to the exchanged space, between speaker and bell.
My consideration of sound reaches out from the formal mechanics of studio composition to investigate revealed gestures of sonic transformation. This concept draws from the possibilities of the recording studio which I view as a realm of both exacting control and indeterminate discovery - an historically idealized, sonic "non-place" where time and space exist outside the usual constraints of reality. By relocating these spatial and temporal alterations back into an immediate and material presence, Reflection pursues moments of perceived transformation that consider the terrain between present and re-presented auditory experience.
I have investigated these ideas in a series of works which include installations of deconstructed musical objects, such as music boxes and player pianos, and most recently, a choral/spatial composition. My interest in automated mechanical instruments is bound up in the visibility of both material and mechanism as it relates to the pre-history of recorded sound. Rather than approaching these objects with a sense of preservation, my work seeks to engage and transform their inherent physicality, through spatial, temporal, and material interventions. This approach encourages a layered array of listening possibilities, all of which originate from re-situating simple, musical gestures out of the hermetically sealed doors of the studio environment and into the fabric of worldly experience.
