Gesture

The Joy of Loss is a multi-disciplinary installation with seven distinct aspects that seek equilibrium in realising and expressing loss and transcendence.

I call these distinct aspects ‘gestures’.

For me, gesture is the basic, identifiable organisational unit. Gestures interact, have characteristics that can be shared and influence other gestures, and create hybrid gestural forms that exhibit qualities of its antecedent forms. If you like, you can read about it in Gesture in composition: A model of composition involving gesture, gestural and parametric development, and hybridisation as examined in six original compositions – the thesis that synthesised much of my compositional technique in instrumental music up to 2002.  It explores the area in some significant detail with sound and score examples.  And it is a great cure for insomnia too. Since that time, I’ve migrated the compositional methodology into other domains including electronic and electro-acoustic music, psychoacoustic music and infrasonics, video, improvisational praxis, noise and air.

For now, I’ll simply list the gestural forms within which the developmental processes will begin, and will delve into the methodology and how the gestures behave and interact throughout the course of future blog entries:

Gesture 1: Fire installation

Gesture 2: Air and infrasonic installation

Gesture 3: Eight-channel surround installation

Gesture 4: iPad orchestra

Gesture 5: Live dance/movement performance

Gesture 6: Live music performance

Gesture 7: Silent interviews

Some of the silent interviews are already populating the blog.  More will be up soon…