New Electroacoustic Music inspired by Art
Three of the Barber Institute’s best-loved paintings – as you’ve never heard them before!
In this exciting sound installation, a collaboration with the University’s Department of Music, three postgraduate composers were commissioned to create new short electroacoustic pieces, inspired by works in the Barber collection. They chose three very different pictures – Daubigny’s brooding19th-century French Seascape, c. 1867, Renoir’s charming Impressionist work Young Woman Seated, c. 1876, and Magritte’s surrealist conundrum The Flavour of Tears, 1948. Sonic Visions offers the opportunity to re-experience these pictures, accompanied by the very different sound works that they inspired, performed in 8-channel surround sound.
All three composers – Constantinos Kontos (Greece), Julien Guillamat (France) and Chris Tarren (UK) – are regular performers with BEAST – Birmingham ElectroAcoustic Sound Theatre, the performance wing of the University’s Electroacoustic Music Studios. BEAST’s aim is to bring a dramatic and immersive sonic experience to its audience – space, movement and the evocation of place are key aspects of its approach, all of which figure in these exciting new works.
Listen to the pieces here and view the corresponding pictures in the gallery to the right:
Julien Guillamat: Le gout des larmes (Inspired by ‘The Flavour of Tears’)
Chris Tarren: A Moments Reflection (Inspired by ‘Seascape’)
Constantinos Kontos: Renoir (Inspired by ‘Young Woman Seated’)
