Wednesday 9^th March 2011, 1.15-2.45pm
Room 106, University of Westminster, 32-38 Wells Street, London W1T 3UW

Joe Banks (AHRC Research Fellow in the Creative and Performing Arts)
Rorschach Audio: Art and Illusion for Sound – Lecture & demonstration

Visual and sound and artist Joe Banks, based as an AHRC Research Fellow in the Institute, discusses the Spiritualistic phenomena explored by his “Rorschach Audio” research project, exploring Jean Cocteau’s Orphée and Art and Illusion by EH Gombrich in relation to Electronic Voice Phenomena (ghost voice) recording. The presentation focuses on perceptual psychology aspects of its subject matter – including live demonstrations of audio illusions and of related psychoacoustic phenomena – with a second presentation focusing on related literary themes to follow this Autumn.

“It is the story of the signaller who misheard the urgent message ‘Send reinforcements, am going to advance’ as ‘Send three and four pence, am going to a dance’.” E.H. Gombrich

“Sometimes we see a cloud that’s dragonish; A vapour sometime like a bear or lion, A tower’d citadel, a pendant rock, A forked mountain, or blue promontory With trees upon’t, that nod unto the world, And mock our eyes with air.” Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra

[Please note that this replaces the previously advertised Samuel Thomas paper on Pynchon, which has unfortunately had to be cancelled due to illness]

We are thrilled to announce that the IMCC’s Dr Alexa Wright has been awarded an AHRC Fellowship for 2010-11, and will be spending part of the forthcoming academic year as a Fellow at the prestigious Banff Centre in Canada.

Alexa’s AHRC project is entitled ‘A View From Inside’, and is a collaboration with Professor Graham Thornicroft at the Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College, London and Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Dr Heidi Lempp. For the project, Alexa will create a series of eight large-scale digitally manipulated photographic portraits of people with short-term psychotic disorders or episodic conditions like schizophrenia. These images will challenge the viewer to readdress his or her ideas about ‘the type of people’ represented. Subjects will be depicted in such a way that does not make them appear different in any way, but the settings in which they are located will be altered digitally to coincide with the perceptual experiences described by each person.

The project will draw on the symbolism and techniques of eighteenth-century portrait painting as a means of representing the lived experiences of the subjects. Alexa will spend time working with individuals who experience psychotic disorders that lead to an intermittent loss of contact with reality in order to find a language comparable to the codes employed in eighteenth-century portraiture to represent both their outward appearance and their internal experience of what is ‘real’.

At Banff, Alexa will be taking part in the residency ‘The distance between our minds and thoughts equals the distance between our words and mouths’, led by Jan Verwoert, where she will produce her audio/video installation, ‘Heart to Heart’.

The Whitechapel Salon: Matter Matters II: Performance Matters
Thursday 1^st July, 7pm
Study Studio, Whitechapel Gallery, London E1 7QX

Spanning art, architecture, performance and sustainability, this year’s series of four Salon discussions focus on the matter of ‘matter’ – its nature, substance and the productive forces that govern it. For July Gavin Butt (Goldsmiths College, London), Adrian Heathfield (Roehampton University), and Lois Keidan (Director, Live Art Development Agency) consider Performance Matters.

Co-organised by the IMCC and Whitechapel Gallery. Book now to avoid disappointment!

Tickets: £8/£6 (includes free glass of wine)

http://www.whitechapelgallery.org

Alexa Wright is currently showing a new configuration of the Alter Ego installation in Locate Me, an exhibition that examines the impact of new communication technologies on traditional concepts of space at Kunstraum Kreuzberg, Bethanien, Berlin, 22 May – 8 August, 2010. More details here.