ALMOST ALWAYS EVERYWHERE APPARENT Sonia Leber & David

ALMOST ALWAYS EVERYWHERE APPARENTSonia Leber & David Chesworth

Australian Centre for Contemporary ArtHelen Macpherson Smith Commission 2007Education Resource

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Helen Macpherson Smith Commission

The Helen Macpherson Smith Commission is a partnership between the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art and the Helen Macpherson Smith Trust. For the past four years, ACCA’s Artistic Director, Juliana Engberg has selected Australian artists to present ambitious new work in ACCA’s massive exhibition hall. Sonia Leber and David Chesworth are recipients of the third Helen Macpherson Smith Commission. A scaled version of Almost Always Everywhere Apparent was exhibited at Mildura Art Centre from November 2008 – March 2009.

Sonia Leber and David Chesworth join Callum Morton, Daniel von Sturmer and Rosslynd Piggott as alumni of the Helen Machpherson Smith Trust Commission.

CALLUM MORTON BABYLONIA, 2005

Exhibited at ACCA and Bendigo Art Gallery

DANIEL VON STURMER THE FIELD EQUATION, 2006

Exhibited at ACCA and Geelong Art Gallery

SONIA LEBER & DAVID CHESWORTH ALMOST ALWAYS EVERYWHERE APPARENT, 2007

Exhibited at ACCA and Mildura Regional Art Gallery

2005 2006

2007

Previous Helen Macpherson Smith Commissions

2008

ROSSLYND PIGGOTTEXTRACT: IN 3 PARTS, 2008

Exhibited at ACCA

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Planning for Learning

Sonia Leber and David Chesworth’s 2007 installation Almost Always Everywhere Apparent is a multifaceted work that requires a knowledge and understanding of ideas about architecture, lighting, sound, space and philosophical enquiry. Students can potentially engage with a variety of elements within the work or focus on a particular aspect such as Jeremy Bentham’s idea of the panopticon or the relationship between sound and space.

Almost Always Everywhere Apparent is relevant to study in VCE Art, Studio Art, Media, Philosophy, English, Religion, Music, and Drama.

Sonia Leber and David ChesworthAlmost Always Everywhere Apparent, 2007

Learning Objectives

To develop a broader understanding of Australian contemporary art.To enhance the ability to interpret, analyse and discuss contemporary art.To consider the relationship between architecture, space and sound.

Glossary

Panopticon A building, as a prison, hospital, library, or the like, so arranged that all parts of the interior are visible from a single point.

Omnipresent Present everywhere simultaneously.

Sound The sensation produced by stimulation of the or-gans of hearing by vibrations transmitted through the air or other medium.

Space The unlimited or incalculably great three-dimensional realm or expanse in which all material objects are located and all events occur.

Ecclesiastical Of or pertaining to the church or the clergy; churchly; clerical; not secular.

Secular Of or pertaining to worldly things or to things that are not regarded as religious, spiritual, or sacred; temporal: secular interests.

Themes and Ideas

-Sound and the human voice-Space, architecture and social enquiry-Intimacy and space-Confinement, observation and surveillance

ALMOST ALWAYS EVERYWHERE APPARENT

Sound, video and installation artists Sonia Leber and David Chesworth create a ‘polyphonic phantasmagoria’ at ACCA as the third annual Helen Macpherson Smith Commission recipients. Human voices resonate through a series of corridors, all leading into a central, cathedral-like space. Leber and Chesworth combine the ecclesiastical and the secular in this massive sound and structure project.


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Biography

Sonia Leber born Melbourne, 1959David Chesworth born Stoke, England,1958

Sonia Leber and David Chesworth have collaborated since 1996, creating unique multi-channel sound and multimedia installations for a diverse range of arts and public spaces. A particular focus is the creation of sonic event spaces in the public domain.

Public artworks include The Master's Voice, a permanent soundscape installation for City Walk, Canberra, commissioned by ACT Public Art Program in 2001 and 5000 Calls, a permanent soundscape installation commissioned by the Sydney Olympic Park Public Art Program in 2000.

Reiterations (Elizabeth Street), an audio project for +Plus Factors, commissioned by the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art in 2006 was also exhibited at the 2007 Madrid Abierto. Leber and Chesworth created The Gordon Assumption for the visual art program of the Melbourne International Arts Festival in 2004, and Chesworth's opera Cosmonaut was featured in the festival's performance program in the same year. The video installation, The Persuaders, was commissioned for the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, Melbourne in 2003.

Leber and Chesworth collaborated with Simeon Nelson on Proximities: local histories/global entanglements, a built-in soundscape artwork along William Barak Bridge for the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne and Oceanic Endless for Melbourne's Cardinia Shire Council in 2007.

Sonia Leber’s films have been exhibited widely at film festivals and contemporary art spaces including Germany’s Oberhausen International Film Festival, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney and Australian Perspecta at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. In 1994, Leber curated the sound art event Earwitness: Excursions in Sound for Melbourne’s Contemporary Music Events.

David Chesworth began creating sound works in 1978 with groups including Essendon Airport at the Clifton Hill Community Music Centre. His music compositions and sound installations have since been performed and exhibited extensively in Australia and internationally.

At the same time as research began on Almost Always Everywhere Apparent, Sonia and David began work on a permanent sound installation for Port Arthur prison in Tasmania which has also influened the development of this project.


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Sonia Leber and David Chesworth’s past works:

Leber and Chesworth traditionally work outside rather than inside. They’re previous works include:

•2006 - Proximities: Local histories/Global entanglements, 2006 Commonwealth Games public art commission, in collaboration with Simeon Nelson, William Barak Bridge, Melbourne, Australia

Is a soundscape conceived as a sonic corridor of human voices. The project is built up around recordings made by the artists of people from the 53 Commonwealth nations who are now living in Australia.

•2004 - The Gordon Assumption, Melbourne International Arts Festival Visual Arts Program, installation in Gordon Reserve, Melbourne

An incessant outpouring of female voices lures passersby down the stairwell to the cave-like subterranean toilets. At the lower gates, they are confronted with an asynchronous chorus of female voices in infinitely rising pitch. The voices gather and thicken without respite, in upwards glissandi, constantly trailing upwards. Behind the locked gates, the luminous green chamber beckons as a single vertical slit of brilliant white light slowly scans the surfaces.

•1998-00 - 5000 Calls, Sydney Olympic Park public art commission, surrounding Stadium Australia, Sydney, Australia (2000 NAWIC Award)

5000 Calls is a large-scale multi-channel sound installation installed throughout the Urban Forest, an extensive 4.5 hectare loose grid of eucalyptus trees surrounding the Stadium Australia in Sydney. 5000 calls is very similar to Almost Always Everywhere Apparent.

Source: http://www.waxsm.com.au/featured.htm

5000 Calls, Sydney Olympic Park public art commission, surrounding Stadium Australia, Sydney, Australia 1998 - 00

The Gordon Assumption, Melbourne International Arts Festival Visual Arts Program, installation in Gordon Reserve, Melbourne 2004

Proximities: Local histories/Global entanglements, 2006 Commonwealth Games public art commission, in collaboration with Simeon Nelson,

William Barak Bridge, Melbourne, Australia 2006

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Context

Drawing upon their diverse experiences in cinema and music, Leber and Chesworth’s commission uses the human voice as the art object, stripped from its association with language and the body. Leber & Chesworth’s installation Almost Always Everywhere Apparent is fixed upon the role of sound in space. In the chamber or ‘panopticon’, recorded voices and human sound below and from the corridors float from the structure above.

•Sound – recorded voices and human noises.•Space – the architectural environment, in particular the large cavernous exhibition hall at ACCA and Jeremy Bentham’s Panopticon.

Almost Always Everywhere Apparent is explicitly influenced by ACCA’s vast exhibition space. When Leber and Chesworth began thinking about how they would respond to the Helen Macpherson Smith Commission, they visited ACCA between exhibitions when the main exhibition hall was empty. In this space, both Leber and Chesworth created sounds with their voice. Leber noticed that “voices had a persistence...voices lingered inside the space”. (accaonline podcast)

Crowds of people and the sounds created by them are a constant fascination for Leber and Chesworth. Whether it is a choir of people in song or the chatter and incidental noise created through the movement of a crowd within a space, their tuned ears sensitively notice the importance and potential of recording and amplifying the sound for others to notice as well.

Leber and Chesworth are also interested in the resurgence of ideas about religion and spirituality. For example, the increasing influence of religion over ideology, superstition over rational thinking or the influence over what we feel versus what we think.

ACCA’s Main Exhibition Hall


Description of Almost Always Everywhere Apparent

We enter Almost Always Everywhere Apparent, through a door way that leads to a small anti chamber. After opening a second door and walking down a long, dimly lit passage way noises, voices and sounds become audible. At the end of this passage way we reach the centre of the work. The central space, hub or oval atrium, radiate five other corridors of different lengths. Above the central atrium is a dark space or void that opens out into the main gallery. At the centre of the void is a video projection of a slowly rotating industrial fan, circling at different speeds.

The elements of sound can be divided into two groups. The “above” include the Royal Philarmonic Choir and samples from David’s archive. These sung sounds are often described as etheral, united, soaring and plummeting. In the corridors, the “lower” sounds remind us of real life situations, instinctive, spontaneous and random - the language of the body. The soundscapes become louder in the centre of the work. It surround us. People will hear the “upper” voices leak in through the space and mix with the “lower” voices. Also travelling throughout the work is the sound of morse code dating back from the 1970’s. This background noise evokes a feeling of travelling through space. At the end of each corridor there are peep holes to look through. People will see a variety of images through the observation holes that are open to interpretation.

The structure or space recalls that of a cathedral, departure lounge or spaceship. Sonia and David were very interested in creating a juncture between two types of architectural ideas - the cathedral and panopticon. Jeremy Bentham, social reformist and designer of the panopticon was concerned about the environment in which prisoners were rehabilitated for society. Bentham designed a panopticon as a structure for permanent observation and surveillance. Bentham intended prisoners to be bathed in natural light. Permanent observation encouraged self-reflection to improve moral and ethical behaviour.

Religious experience is strongly associated with Almost Always Everywhere Apparent through the architectural environment, images and sounds. The influence of the omnipresent (being present everywhere at once), for example of a religious or spiritual figure observing us, is obvious in the design of the panopticon. The structure of a panopticon powerfully conveys a feeling of being watched or observed.

The video aspects of Almost Always Everywhere Apparent are presented through the peepholes. There are five different visions that create ambivalence towards reality and gravity – where the audience is positioned within the work and what is being looked at. One of the videos is of a choir filmed from above, looking down from the central dome in St. Paul’s Cathedral in London. Other images include ambiguous shadows playing over a disk of light.

Another video shows people dressed in black that appear to be stuck to the ceiling of a cell. These images provide the audience with the opportunity to take them to an imaginary space removed from the structured architecture of the panopticon.


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n Interpreting Almost Always Everywhere Apparent

Almost Always Everywhere Apparent is defined as an installation as the work is site specific and is installed within a defined time frame. It is also considered to be an installation as Almost Always Everywhere Apparent is made up of images, sounds and spaces.

The idea for Almost Always Everywhere Apparent emerged from:

-Sonia Leber & David Chesworth professional art experiences and research-ACCA’s grand gallery space and the sounds that were made from voices inside the space-Jeremy Bentham and the ideas of a Panopticon-Michael Focuault’s Discipline & Punish

How could I begin to describe the work?Consider Almost Always Everywhere Apparent as three distinct sections. These could be:-Sound-Architecture-Imagery

Consider how the voices, sounds, images, and spaces combine to create a particular feeling or awareness...

Think about the architecture/space/structure...•Vastness/intimacy•Peep holes/observation/surveillance•Panopticon/prison•Cathedral/chapel/church•Omnipresent/heaven/hell•Tunnels/direction/choice•Thresholds/stages

Think about the sound/noise/voice/song...•Human voice•Upper voices (thickly sung by a group or choir)•Lower voices (recorded fragments of human sounds)•Proto linguistic sound•Choir/singing•White noise/morse code




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VCE Art Frameworks

Listed below each framework are starting points to explore the messages and meanings of Almost Always Everywhere Apparent. Consider comparing historical work by Gianlorenzo Bernini or John Cage with Almost Always Everywhere Apparent.

Formal

Art Elements & Principles-Sound: voice, noise, song (discuss the voice to represent the unseen and the idea that sound is another form of language).-Space: defined, closed, restricted-Scale: massive, intimate, internal

Materials & TechniquesBuilding structures-Qualified builders were required to create the panopticon structure-Electrical contractors were required to install the lighting, video and sound elements of the work.

Video and Sound projection-Capture and recording of images and sounds-Editing, sequence, order and arrangement of images and sounds-Presentation of images and sounds

Style-Installation Art-Contemporary Art-Classical Art

Historical-Jeremy Bentham, English Utilitarian and Social Reformist-Architectural design of prison and churches

Cultural-Refer to a selection of quotes in Michael Foucault’s essay Discipline & Punishment and then connect these to Almost Always Everywhere Apparent.- Read Christos Tsiolkas, Dead Europe, 2005 and discuss in connection to Almost Always Everywhere Apparent.

Gender-What associations with masculinity, androgyny and femininity does Almost Always Everywhere Apparent explore?

Psychoanalytical-What past experiences does the work remind you of?-What personal references to the artists are included in this work?

Political-How does the Almost Always Everywhere Apparent comment upon the contemporary world’s ability to monitor, survey and observe the public’s actual and virtual movement?

Symbolism-What do the images, sounds, and architecture remind you of?-How does the architecture of Almost Always Everywhere Apparent symbolise prision or church architecture?

ACCA FLOORPLAN

MILDURA ARTS CENTRE FLOORPLAN

Commentaries

“Leber and Chesworth have been devoted to exploring the voice as an object in itself, broken free from it’s connection to the body and language”. Juliana Engberg, 2007

“People are kind of trapped. As a visitor to the space, you can see the others and they can see you, and these relationships play out. It’s an architectural form that connects to the panopticon, and the cathedral – the upper and the lower”. Sonia Leber, 2007

“They are the sounds people make before they can express themselves in any language”. David Chesworth, 2007

“Ultimately we hear things because we cannot see everything”. I Hear You With My Eyes, Slavoj Zizek

“The assumption that music can heighten creative contemplation or even destroy defensive shields grants it a great deal of power. Sonia Leber and David Chesworth’s practice operates somewhere between these two extremes, but I suspect that they also share the view that music, and sounds in general, transform not only the experience of space but also take an active role in shaping our consciousness”. Nikos Papastergidis 2007

“What is the lifespan of a sound?” Nikos Papastergidis, 2007

“Sound is perhaps the most elusive element. It has no real end, and it cannot be relied upon to achieve social ends in a linear manner”. Nikos Papastergidis, 2007

“There are voices everywhere, shooting down the corridors, arriving at the listener/viewer from various parts of the installation. The idea that the voice is unbounded; it can’t be trapped. There is a connection with omnipresence through the sound”. Sonia Leber, 2007

Further Research

Sonia Leber & David Chesworth’s website: Wax Sound Mediahttp://www.waxsm.com.au/

Michael Foucault: French Philosopherhttp://www.michel-foucault.com/

Jeremy Bentham: English Utilitarian and Social Reformerhttp://www.utilitarianism.com/bentham.htm

Royal Melbourne Philharmonic Orchestrahttp://www.rmp.org.au/

Helen Macpherson Smith Trusthttp://www.hmstrust.org.au/

Slavoj Zizek: Post Marxist sociologist, philosopher and cultural critichttp://www.lacan.com/zizekchro1.htm

Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish (1975), Panopticism http://foucault.info/documents/disciplineAndPunish/foucault.disciplineAndPunish.panOpticism.html

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Documents

ALMOST ALWAYS EVERYWHERE APPARENT Sonia Leber & David