[Concert] Spectres Live

01 July 2017

“Spectres Live”---The O.P.E.N. (Singapore International Festival of Arts)

Country: Singapore

Performance: Zai Tang, Fuzz Lee, Shark Fung, Wu Jun Han (for the 1^st of July)

Location I watched: 72-13

“Spectres Live” is an electronic music performance as a response to an audio-visual installation, “Spectres”. I did not go to watch “Spectres” and watch only “Spectres Live”. For reference, here is the introduction from the festival program about what kind of installation “Spectres” is.

“Spectres is an artistic response to the Anthropocene epoch, a geological time when human activity has been the dominant influence on climate and the environment.

Evoking dystopian narratives of a future in which the wildlife of Singapore has all but vanished, Spectres takes the form of an immersive audio-visual installation. Its environment is haunted by the remnants of sounds that once inhabited this island.

Derived from artist, composer and sound designer Zai Tang’s archive of field recordings in local natural habitats, Spectres brings these deceased sonorities back to life, re-animating them using digital imaging and sound visualisation techniques.

Yet, these ethereal images and sounds no longer resemble the creatures from which they originated. They have metamorphosed into myriad phantasmagoric forms and disfigured expressions, embodying a deep, full vision of a desolate horizon.” (from the festival program)

This is a publicity image from the show.

From my understanding of this introduction, “Spectres” is an audio-visual installation by using audio recordings of natural sounds to express dystopian future when nature is destroyed and life is extinct. The present natural sounds are processed and used to express the future sprits (spectres) from a dead nature.

In “Spectres Live”, Zai Tang, the artist of “Spectres” collaborated with some experimental musicians to produce live performances following the theme of “Spectres”. “Spectres Live” is shown for three continuous nights and every night, different musicians play with Zai Tang. The program of the day that I went is as follows:

The first set: Fuzz Lee, Shark Fung

Short break

The second set: Zai Tang, Wu Jun Han

Short break

The final set: Zai Tang, Fuzz Lee, Shark Fung, Wu Jun Han

The venue, 72-13, I do not like because it is far from any train stations or any bus stops despite being located in the centre of the city. Whenever I go there, I am always wondering which route is the most efficient. This makes me feel irritated.

Anyway, for “Spectres Live”, when I reached 72-13, the first set has already started. I was 10 minutes late, but this performance does not require for you to stay there all the time. When you go in the venue studio, there is a stage with music equipment (an electric guitar, mixing desk, cassette tapes etc.) in the centre. Around the stage, many big white cloths are hanging from the ceiling and different images are projected on them. While you are listening to the musicians’ play, you can walk around among the cloths or sit on the floor. You can even lie down on the floor. I saw somebody sleeping.

This image taken during the performance

I do not have good ears and I do not properly understand it, but for some reason, I like listening to experimental music or sonic installation. That is why I was sitting on the cold floor of 72-13 studio among the young hipsters or geeks. Actually I did not feel dystopia or something ethereal from their performance. Anyway I was sometimes browsing and sometimes chilling on the floor under the cloths. I was half thinking about today’s work from the office (I went there after work on that day) and half absent-minded during watching and listening. How to spend time like that is OK to me and I enjoyed that. In all the 3 sets, the 2^nd set sounded the most friendly because it had a rhythmic tempo.

There is one request I have. As I have a backache, sitting on the hard floor was tough for me. If only there had been some cushions, sofas or a mat covering the floor… (20 July 2017)

The venue, 72-13

[Film] The Death of Louis XIV (La Mort de Louis XIV)

01 July 2017

“The Death of Louis XIV (La Mort de Louis XIV)”---The O.P.E.N. (Singapore International Festival of Arts)

Release Year: 2016

Country: France, Spain

Director: Albert Serra

Cast: Jean-Pierre Leaud

Location I watched: The Projector

In August of 1715, “Le Roi Soleil (the Sun King)”, Louis XIV feels a pain in his left leg after going for a morning walk. From that point, “The Death of Louis XIV” scrupulously shows the king’s condition until his death by gangrene of his leg on the 1^st of September.

 The camera does not leave the palace building, just like the King who has to be stuck on his bed. As the windows are not opened, even in daytime, his bedroom is left in the twilight. At night, the room vanished into the darkness. The small light from the outside or a candle is focusing on the King. Around him, his doctor or valets are working like shadows in the vague dark.

Even if he is suffering from a serious disease, the King has to be king. He still has to wear a wig and receive his courtiers in audience. On the other hand, the King is taken care of by many people. Not only people who are working in the palace, but also scholars from the Sorbonne come for him. The King lies down on the luxurious bed and drinks water from a crystal glass. Expensive and nutritious food is always served for him. What a high life with duties! However, the death of the King does not have a significant difference from death in our own day. While the disease is covering his body, he is getting weaker and weaker. At first, he cannot stand up, and then he cannot sit up in bed, and cannot swallow food. Finally he cannot drink even water. The slow death would possibly happen to us in a present day hospital room with much more advanced medical technology than the King’s era.

The most impressive point is that the King does not easily pass away, while he is enduring such severe pain that he wished to cut off his leg. Priests were invited to his bedroom many times, but the time does not come. Once priests are invited and starting the Communion service for people around the King’s bed, the King is still eating a piece of biscuit and sipping drink. His body is dying, but his eyes facing the camera are still burning with the will to live. Humans’ strength to stay alive is amazing. However, humans are not immortal. The King even tried “medicine” brought by an impostor (it is like we try a suspicious folk remedy in desperate condition), but nobody can save him. Finally the fire of the King’s life is snuffed out, in a natural and quiet way. It would also possibly happen on us.

“The Death of Louis XIV“ was screened at 8 pm on Sunday. It is a good film, but after watching such an uncheerful theme film on a Sunday night, I did not feel like going to work tomorrow morning. (July 15, 2017)