LOS PANCHOS

Los Panchos is a musical trio that plays and sings typical nostalgic Latin-American music. They are particularly popular amongst a generation of people who identify with old-fashioned romance, where relationships are enjoyed through a sense of endurance. I find that these performances explore the limits of the relationship between the performer and the objects they operate with, and between the materials that make musical production possible. Pedro Gómez-Egaña

This year’s AudioSpace seminar will explore the question of the instrument as it appears in art, sound art and contemporary music. The seminar includes a performance, Los Panchos in which the visiting artists will rehearse this question in different practical ways.

Icaro Zorbar is a Colombian artist who works with machines and songs. His work is of a performative character, using cassette tapes, fans, and music boxes. Sometimes his presence among the machines and sounds takes on the form of “assisted installations”. Icaro holds an MFA from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia. He has exhibited at the Buenos Aires Museum of Contemporary Art, Galería Vermelho in Sao Paulo, the “Younger than Jesus” exhibition at the New Museum in New York, and the Beijing Biennale. His work features in the collection of the Cisneros Fontanals Arts Foundation, which awarded him a Grant Award in 2008. Zorbar currently lives and works in Bogotá, Colombia.

About his work Zorbar writes: “I work with machines in circumstances that relate to sentiments between people. This is what really inspires me. I intervene, give voice or a fate; I propose conversations, formulate encounters and separations. I seek to deploy and enhance the fragility of certain connections in which I find a constant tension. I find that disillusionment in the face of a technological reality is important in that it evidences human nature and everydaylife.”
icarozorbar.wordpress.com

John Lely is a composer and performer based in the UK. He studied composition at Goldsmiths College, London with Roger Redgate and John Tilbury, and privately with Michael Parsons. In 2007 he was a resident composer at Ostrava New Music Days. His music has been featured internationally at festivals such as MaerzMusik, Ultima, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, Cutting Edge and Open Sound Systems (Tate Modern, London). Broadcasts have included: BBC 4 Television, BBC Radio 3, DeutschlandRadio and Resonance FM. He performs in various groups including Apartment House, LelyWhite (electronic chamber music with composer John White) and the ever-populous 9! with Eddie Prévost. Three improvised CDs are available through Matchless Recordings. Alongside composers Tim Parkinson and Markus Trunk, he co-curates the annual Music We’d Like to Hear concert series. From 2007-8 he was responsible for the digitisation of the Daphne Oram Collection at Goldsmiths College.

Presently Lely is engaged in a research project spanning over two years, entitled “Words and Music”, which is financed by the British Arts and Humanity Research Centre (AHRC). The project is based at Bath Spa University and examines textual scores, an alternative notation where text replaces notes and other conventional musical symbols. He also teaches experimental acoustic art at the Chelsea College of Arts. Digital expressions and interactivity are central elements in several of his works. A common trait is also the use of mp3 player and Dictaphone and/or involving the audience from the stage John Lely will show his performance “Time Travel at the British Museum” at Litteraturhuset, 17th of September at 7 pm as part of Ultima.

http://www.johnlely.co.uk/

Pedro Gómez-Egaña is a Colombian artist who is currently based in Norway. He was educated as a composer and a visual artist at Goldsmiths College and at the Bergen National Academy of Arts. His practice includes sculpture, performance, video, installation and sound works. Gómez- Egaña’s recent artistic production forms part of a large-scale project entitled “Calligraphies”, supported by the Norwegian Artistic Fellowships Programme, which could be seen as an exploration of motion in relation to fundamental forces like gravity, repetition, accidentality, or anxiety. His works often include compositions of text and phonographic material, as well as mechanical or video animations of simple drawings. Although his practice involves multiple technical resources and artistic disciplines it appears to construct worlds of incisive simplicity.

Prior to “Calligraphies” Gómez-Egaña carried out a three-year research project on the relationship between musicality and physicality, sponsored by the British Council that included various collaborative and solo exhibitions, performances and papers. He has been involved with art, music, dance venues, exhibitions and festivals including the South Bank Centre’s Purcell Room in London, the Brussels Biennial 2008, the Kunstraum Kreuzberg-Bethanien-Berlin, FACT Liverpool, Rencontre International d’Art Performance de Quebec, Multipistes-Amsterdam, 66East Amsterdam, the Institute of Contemporary Art London, DareDare Montreal, Tanz Quartier Wien, BMIC London cutting edge series, La Source de Lion-Casablanca, and L’appartement 22 Morocco. This autumn Pedro will show at the Marrakech Biennial, Bogotá’s art fair, and the Museum of Contemporary Art of Buenos Aires. Gómez-Egaña has been guest and resident lecturer at the MA programme in visual arts at Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Goldsmiths College, London, and the Laban Centre, London.

http://www.pedrogomezegana.net

Karen Skog Orkester
Organ: Erik Andreas Røkland. Cello: Sivert Nikolai Nesbø. Violin and theremin: Karen Skog

A text about an Orchestra by Karen Skog:
"A cello, an organ, a violin and a theremin are standing in a room. Three people are playing an improvised concert. This project started about a year ago, when I attempted to make my own cello. There are many things in this world, and even the big ships are made by slowly working hands. Many years ago, when people only built what they needed, there were no standards. In some old books you can find all kinds of different instruments. When you are doing something you have never done before, new observations may appear. And one late evening, about a year ago, I tuned the four strings, before slowly eliciting the sound. There are these moments when your mind moves backwards, and without knowing it you can travel hundreds of miles away. I saw my orchestra sitting in a big hall tuning their instruments. The sound of these four instruments came into my mind, and I called it “She was talking about this Orchestra”. The orchestra includes three musicians: Sivert Nikolai Nesbø, the cellist and organist;, Erik Andreas Røkland, the organist and cellist and myself, Karen Skog, the violinist and thereminist. One person starts playing and the others come in slowly. We are standing listening to each others´ instrument, carefully tuning into one universe of sounds."

Karen Skog has an MA degree in Art from Bergen National Academy of the Arts (2007-2009). She is part of the new studio group Bergen Ateliergruppe and recently participated in the art project C/O Visningsrommet at Visningsrommet USF in the summer of 2009. She works with installations, in-between spatial spheres, scenography and sound art. In November she will participate at the NEU/NOW Festival in Vilnius – The European Capital of Culture 2009.