Today I visited the Special's Collection at MMU. My intention was to research artists who have incorporated audio with publication based work. On reflection of my recent explorations of the Metro's new districts and stops, one major aspect of my field studies were missing. Audio. Has this been brought to my attention due to working with sound in my previous project 'Scrapbook'? Maybe. I think I am much more aware of the potential audio has to bring to an image based project, and with trams screeching past me, it was hard to ignore. I have been in touch with an artist who will be producing a soundscape from field recordings he has made and manipulated while travelling the new Metro lines. I am aware that this isn't a new approach to photography, but I wanted to see a few more traditional examples about how it has been tackled in the past with physical publication's. I will soon be researching into new media's such as flash and web based projects to see how contemporary artists have worked combining these mediums.
Aspen No.7 - 'British Box in 15 Sections'
Aspen was created by Phyllis Johnson, and seemed to be issued sporadically for around ten years from 1965. Her aim was to produce a multimedia publication with the intention to give the featured artists a broader choice of output. 'We wanted to get away from the bound magazine, which is really quite restrictive'. The idea of a publication being restrictive on its own is something I can relate to, a publication doesn't have to be strictly image based, many medias can be involved. What struck me the most about this publication was how diverse and fresh this work still seems. Even compared to some contemporary photographers who seem to almost settle on an image being flat in a magazine or hung in a white cube. This particular issue has various fold out posters, Ossie Clark's 'British Knickers' underwear making pattern's, Eduardo Paolozzi's 'The Gay Atomic Colouring Book', and audio recordings by Yoko Ono & John Lennon, which were pressed on Flexi-disc (previous issues have also included Super 8 video's). Without the option to produce these playful interactive projects, they wouldn't work. A still image of the underwear pattern split between two pages in a magazine wouldn't give you the scale or the texture of the traditional material it was produced on. As I carried on sifting through all the material of the box set publication, I began to realize that I was unable to listen to the actual audio (which I managed to listen to online after I left the library). This project was created to be experienced by a group of people. Colour the book together while the audio is playing in the background, discuss the ideas. Is this approach restricting? Some people may not have access to audio playing equipment, and certain audio mediums become quickly obsolete. Also in some cases the equipment may only be accessible to one person at a time. Creating an installation with both images and audio would compliment the mediums while broadening your audience. This will be something I will consider when finalizing the Metro project.
Helen Douglas & Zoé Irvine - Illiers Combray
Illiers Combray was produced in 2004 by Helen Douglas & Zoé Irvine. It takes the form of a constatina book with two mini audio CD's. The project was produced over a week long visit to Illiers after being insired by the novel 'In Search of Lost Time' by Marcel Proust. What intrigued me the most about this project was how similar the images and audio were to each other. Each photograph seemed to blend from one to another as if it was a constant mural telling a story. The audio complemented well as it seemed to weave through the images as delicatly as the images merged into each other. This is a strong example of how audio and visual can work together, Rather than being seen as two different mediums addressing the same themes, they come together as one.
Phyllis Johnson quote from Modernism 101
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