Looking at sound / listening to image

Abstract

This thesis discusses my new sound drawing practice and its development throughout the course of my practice-based PhD research at Brunel School of Arts. “Sound drawing” is a general term that I have chosen to use to describe a body of visual artworks that instigated the composition of soundscapes as well as the design of an audiovisual performance instrument. I will start by giving a clear picture of the musical and visual arts background that led up to my current sound drawing practice. Then I will go through the individual works created between 2008 and 2012 that have contributed the most to the development of sound drawing. I will discuss how performance sketches... (2009) instigated the shift from composing graphic scores to sound drawing when I was confronted with drawing my graphic scores in real time. In 31 (sound) studies on paper (2010-2011), the sound drawing process began to mature through a closer examination of the visual imagery, drawing materials, physical gestures and the overall sound production. As I started to develop solo performance projects based on my sound drawing practice, I looked back to the compositions projection-reaction (2008-2009) and de (re)construction (2009) which suggested how I might return to using the medium of video. My most recent work, drawalineandlistentoit and R=15 (2012), seems to constitute a point where all the different strands in my works of the preceding four years come together to produce an intricate collaboration between sound, image and performer. Working with the sound drawings within a performance context, a registration of the sonic event occurs, a form of score is created – and at the same time sound is mixing and moving into the space through the audio software Plogue Bidule, while a visual projection is constructed in realtimev through the VPT software.