Event Venue
37 Swanston Street
Gerard Crewdson
For SOUND SERIES 2018, Gerard Crewdson presents site-specific acoustic sound sculptures. The centrepiece of the exhibition is a natural horn, nearly 5 metres long, made from a single hollow tube (like a didgeridoo) and played with a mouthpiece (like a Swiss alphorn). The horn resembles a ‘serpent’ – not only the creature – but also the instrument of that name which was the predecessor of the modern-day tuba.
Low brass instruments have traditionally been associated with raising the voices of the dead in both Western and non-Western cultures. These are the ‘serpent songs’ of the title but also the ‘windshadows’ – a compound word taken from a Paul Celan poem, Weiss Und Leicht / White and Light. This might be read as a wind of shades, of ghosts, blowing over the genocidal landscape of post WWII Europe.
BLINDSIDE stands upon stolen, never ceded Wurundjeri land – a genocidal landscape with its own wind of shades, of ghosts, of voices lost or never heard. Crewdson’s other sound sculptures – a ‘Rice Wheel’ and ‘Galileo Drum’ – generate sound through gravity-produced falling motion, thereby also acknowledging the Wurundjeri ground upon which the gallery and surrounding city, stand.
IMAGE | Gerard Crewdson, Wheel Spoke Prototypes, Pyramid Club Studio, Feb 2018, recycled bamboo slats, butter paper, rabbit skin glue and shellac. Photograph Dan Beban | Annotated conceptual sketches for Serpent Songs/Windshadows, 2018 | Sequence of images from TERRIBILITA, Cinema of the Poor, 2018 | Courtesy the artist.
Gallery Open | Tuesday-Saturday, 12pm-6pm
Opening Night | Thursday 21 Jun, 6–8pm
Opening Performance | Gerard Crewdson / Jeff Henderson / Dale Gorfinkel
Gerard Crewdson creates a live sound track for TERRIBILITA, a visual narrative from Cinema of the Poor. Gerard will play a tenor trombone, soprano trombone and other acoustic noise-makers.
Improvised Music and Performance
Fri 22 June 6-8pm | Gerard Crewdson / Jeff Henderson / Dale Gorfinkel / Sage Pbbt / Adam Simmons
Sat 23 June 6-8pm | Gerard Crewdson / Jeff Henderson / Nat Grant / Sean Baxter / Jenny Ruth Barnes / The Charles Ives Singers
Daily Performances | 4-5pm
Tue 26-Sat 30 June and Thur 5 + Fri 6 July | Gerard Crewdson
Closing Performance
Sat 7 July 2-4pm | Gerard Crewdson / Antony Riddell
Extended Performance Program arranged by Jeff Henderson, Audio Foundation New Zealand in partnership with Liquid Architecture.
SOUND SERIES 2018 BLINDSIDE partners with Liquid Architecture.
Liquid Architecture is an Australian organisation for artists working with sound. LA investigates the sounds themselves, but also the ideas communicated about, and the meaning of, sound and listening.
