Flux #4 - Laboratory One
Flux aims to explore the themes of liminal space, temporality and boundaries, whether physical or theoretical. This exploration is carried out through field recording and sound design. Each episode invites an artist, performer or sound recordist to create a show in reaction to these themes. Exploring a space or spaces they deem relevant through their own creative practice.
Field recordings, on-site improvisations, synthetic resonances, paranormal sensing, spoken texts, underground, on the ground and receiving from off-Earth, in Northumbria, Tyneside, Teesside, East Anglia and Scotland, over the last ten years. Laboratory One takes its name from the abandoned structure at the former Orford Ness Atomic Weapons Research Establishment, a vibration lab to test the resilience of nuclear weapons to in-flight disturbance, and here reimagined as a listening space for other vibrations.
John Bowers (UK) works with modular synthesisers, home-brew electronics, reconstructions of antique image and sound-making devices, self-made software, field recordings and esoteric sensor systems. He makes performance environments which mix sound, image and gesture at a fundamental material level, sometimes accompanied by spoken text.
His practice often combines improvised performance with walking, urban exploration and the investigation of selected sites to conduct research in an imagined discipline he calls ‘mythogeosonics’. He has performed at festivals including the collateral programme of the Venice Biennale, Transmediale/CTM Vorspiel Berlin, Piksel Bergen, Electropixel Nantes, BEAM Uxbridge and Spill Ipswich, and toured with the Rambert Dance Company performing David Tudor’s music to Merce Cunningham’s Rainforest.
He contributed to the design of The Prayer Companion - a piece exhibited twice at the Museum Of Modern Art (MoMA), New York, and acquired for their permanent collection. Amongst many musical collaborations, he works with Sten-Olof Hellström, Tim Shaw, Kerry Hagan and in the noise drone band Tonesucker. He helps coordinate the label Onoma Research and works in Culture Lab and Fine Art, Newcastle University. He is a Director of Allenheads Contemporary Arts and a Trustee of Monkfish Productions.