I worked on this dance piece with choreographer Caley O’Neill in late 2007 while I was still in the first year of my undergraduate degree and Caley was completing her postgraduate diploma. It explores the ideas of imprint and memory. The music is dense and beat heavy, an explosion of sampled body sounds abstracted into glitchy drum loops.
This was a dance project I worked on in 2008 with choreographer Caley O’Neill as part of the completion of her Masters Degree at VCA. The music explores space and a kind of lyrical minimalism, using computer editing to tease a short excerpt of piano improvisation into a 25 minute theme and variations. Both the dance and the sound were very much inspired by the words of Norwegian writer Tarjei Vesaas, in this instance largely by his book The House in the Dark which describes Norway’s involvement in World War II, in particular depicting the goings on in a country house during wartime using it as a metaphor for the country as a whole.
Audio sample
Caley’s words about the piece are below…
Program Notes
This is Where They Are is an installation piece that explores the writing of Tarjei Vesaas. A Norwegian writer with a gift for detail, his novel The House in the Dark has been the stimulant for this work. Written during the war, its controversial words saw it buried in a zinc box for 5 years until it publishing in 1947. Filled with deranged yet fascinating characters this work explores the many physical traits they posses and their inhabiting of the house.
This year has taken me on an amazing journey, on which I have been lucky enough to discover the essence of my own art making. Here I search to find a deeper more embodied performative state in which thick physical environments are created. Through a deeply investigated exploration of improvisation I have tried to create an immersive and intricate physical style that is both interesting and immersive.
Derrida talks of our societies obsession with sense making. However it is here that I ask you to do no such thing. Sit and watch, listen and feel, I ask that you let your imagination do the rest.
I know only how this work is structured…..not what it is about.
Created By: Caley O’Neill
Choreographer – Caley O’Neill in collaboration with the performers
Performers – Alex O’Neill-King, Susan Van Den Ham and Jessica Devereux
Costume and Set Design – Emily Collett and Caley O’Neill
Composer – Camille Robinson
Lighting Design – Alexandre Malta and Caley O’Neill
A short film by Daniel Higgins, currently in production.
Screenings in December.
…the serious lady and the queen bee bump heads in the night…
This was a dance work by Nikki Fay Baxter which I scored in early 2008. The sound included tunes as well as soundscapes evocative of a hive derived from samples of sounds of Nikki and I manipulating an antique book on beekeeping.
Staged at Kick Gallery Northcote.
this event at Contemporary Dance Australia
This was a project I worked on in the first half of 2009 with fellow students from the VCA, including people from the Music, Film & TV and Art schools. The brief for the project was as follows:
To investigate the idea of automation in art/music/performance practice, ways to do this could include…
Look back with a historical perspective to the futurists, investigate their ideas.
Investigate one’s own practice for examples of automation, look for opportunities for automation in one’s own practice.
Design and build machines that make Art and/or music. Manipulate an artist or performer to create works. Is who makes the art as important or more important than the art itself?
Automate yourself out of existence – design/build a machine that replicates your creative process exactly.
Make yourself into an automaton – make art using a strict pre-defined set of rules/principles, outside which you cannot stray.
We began to explore these pathways in a number of discussions and practical creative exercises which culminated in an exhibition/installation in the VCA Art School building. Evidently from the brief there’s a lot of scope for continued work and a lot more could be done in this area than we could cover in a part-time project over one semester. A project I’ll be coming back to in the future…
see the online documentation of this project at Collaborative Commons
This is a parody of the second breakdance battle scene from the film ‘Breakin’.
Look out for me on the wheels of steel, my only acting credit to date.
A couple fractically prepare a meal for someone they’re trying to impress. Concept/written by David Stroud, Rebecca Robinson, Camille Robinson and David Rusanow, Directed by David Rusanow. The score to this film won Best Soundtrack at the 2007 15/15 Film Festival, and it’s the first example of the beat driven end of my experiments with musique concrete. Filled to the brim with every sound I could find in my kitchen and every implement and appliance therein.
Set in a decaying totalitarian bureaucracy two isolated workers briefly make contact. Written and directed by David Rusanow, score by Camille Robinson. Features my own modest talents on the piano and Nick Carver on double bass.
Jimmy’s sick of his parents fighting and decides to take matters into his own hands. Written & Directed by David Rusanow
Camille Robinson 