Outcome

I visited the Miller Gallery for this assignment, which had an exhibition named AFTERSOUND, a collection of pieces that focus on the incorporation of sounds into art, not only as an addition to art, but as the focal point of the work itself. Not only is it appealing to see art forms cross each other, but synesthesia is also fascinating for what experiences the shared sensations provide. I have not had any previous exposure to the pieces in the gallery, so the experience I will describe below is genuine and raw.

I apologize for the quality of the photographs beforehand.

Work

Among the other pieces I considered as the focus of an experience on were these:

These scores break the boundary of traditional musical notation, using more expressive or interpretive notation to convey the gist of a sound. Indeed, like how it is nearly impossible to convey certain scenes or moods through text, it is nearly impossible to convey certain ways of performing music through standard notation. Thus, I would say that it is not uncommon for scorewriters to be inventive with notation.

Éric Normand did something comparable for his piece, sur la glace / on ice, that caught my attention.

At first glance, the piece bears similarity to the other works presented; it looks figurative, more so than the other pieces, but is still a score that is meant to be interpreted as sound. Unfortunately, given the restraints of the technology I have, it may not be immediately prevalent online what the primary distinction between the pieces above and this one is; in short, this piece is not only a score to be interpreted, but it is also an art piece in of itself. That alone gave me a unique experience amidst the other pieces in the exhibition.

Experience & Response

My original response broke the 200-word limit three times over (And I was trying to be compact!), so I will summarize:

The piece felt stark at first, given how it was black on white, when the other interpretive scores had a Manila paper backing. The messy, black blotches caught my eye, and they contrast with the orderly staff on the same canvas. In contrast to the other interpretive scores, the 'notes' here had vertical movement, perpendicular to the horizontal direction of the staff. I Googled Éric Normand and found that he was a guitarist, so I wondered if black dots were meant to be tabs rather than notes.

Once I realized each note was the silhouette of a person, the work became warmer and friendlier. I understood why the piece was named on ice, as this score wasn't just a score, but a scene of a town of people on an ice rink. The black blotches were not messy, but instead organic to the scene. Not only did the people have meaning, but the 'trees' in the foreground and 'sun' in the background also did.

As these works are meant to be interpreted as music, I imagined something wintry and Christmas-like. I wondered what I would have created if I had responded with music rather than try to emulate the experience?

Product

I had to recapture the experience of a stark yet warm scene, all the while being musical in nature. After a moment’s worth of thought, I decided on depicting shapes similar to the barren trees of winter, stripped of their leaves. I wanted to convey a sense of community, though—not necessarily through human shapes. How would I imply music? How about a campfire singalong?

Well, let’s have at it.

(One hour later…)

A funny thing happened while I was developing an image representing my experience. I spend most of my hour trying to get my product idea working, scrapping half of my piece and trying to rework it to no avail in my remaining time. Then, in the last five minutes, I decided to throw away everything and start from scratch. And, I daresay, the product of my last five minutes captures my experience far better than the 55-minute labor.

5-minute, new piece:

In place of a campfire, I abstracted the idea as a fuzzy light. The snow became round bokeh. Instead of trees, which took far too long for a speedpaint, I settled for an inky, black mass dominating the piece. Crisp lines degenerated to blurriness, as that was the best I could settle for to project a sense of coziness. The piece, sure, is less detailed, but the composition works much better.

Reflection

I found it difficult capturing entire experience with its minutia without simply copying the themes in the original artwork. Even trying to capture a fragment of the experience seems off; I am sure that many artists have gone through the pain of wanting to draw something they can see clearly in mind but cannot project it onto a canvas. I similarly feel the pain of not being able to manifest the same experience, and so I feel as though I have failed to accomplish the expected task for this assignment.

If I had to replicate the experience on a digital canvas again, I definitely would pre-plan and manage my time beforehand. Instead of letting the piece stay my mind, it might be productive to sketch out the composition on paper first to check how it appears on a surface. In addition, I should notice how long certain details would take for a speedpaint; for example, I should not take 30 minutes to draw spindly trees with many branches unless I prepopulate Photoshop with brushes beforehand. These assignments are less so of what I can draw as much as determining what is best to draw within a limited time frame.