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Super Critical Mass

That Thing Between Us | 2017

2. Super Critical Mass (Julian Day & Luke Jaaniste), That Thing Between Us, 2017. photo Alex Wisser
2. Super Critical Mass (Julian Day & Luke Jaaniste), That Thing Between Us, 2017. photo Alex Wisser

bio:

Since 2008, SCM has presented over 50 events worldwide with over 3000 participants in such spaces as churches, galleries, libraries, public squares, parklands and lakes. SCM has featured at the Asia Pacific Triennial, QAGOMA Brisbane; FutureEverything, Manchester; Het Nutshuis, The Hague; Central Park, MATA Festival, New York; Spitalfields Music Festival, London; Library of Birmingham; Prague Quadrennial; Liquid Architecture Festival, Brisbane; Sydney Opera House; Australian Design Centre, Sydney; Federation Square, Melbourne; and Arts Centre Melbourne. SCM’s performance work Moving Collected Ambience was recently collected by the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia. SCM is directed by artists and composers Julian Day and Luke Jaaniste.

"That Thing Between Us" 2017

That Thing Between Us is a spatialised work for community voices, featuring a body of regional participants that has accumulated since 2015. Super Critical Mass (SCM) brings together temporary communities to create ambient sound states in publicly accessible places. Each ‘orchestra’ is made up of one type of sound source, whether musical or everyday: 30 ceramic bowls, 50 voices, 100 brass instruments. That Thing Between Us is a study into interdependence. As is typical for SCM the work is planned but unscored and emerges from internalised instructions. As the human voice is organic, each singer must rely on one other to establish and maintain pitch. This creates a dynamic feedback situation reminiscent of early social works by Pauline Oliveros or Cornelius Cardew, a rich and ever-changing sound portrait of a society in action. 12–12.40pm Saturday 8 April

statement:

Super Critical Mass (SCM) brings together local participants to create site-responsive sonic fields in public places, working with identical sound sources and generative instructions. Thus, SCM is an ongoing experiment in how humans perceive, relate to and interact within public space. Using the active ingredients of sound, space and social connections in creative workshops and public performances, SCM examines the nature of particular locations (their use, sociopolitical function, acoustics, topographies), of community (how it builds or falters, who it includes and excludes), of networks (emergence, order and chaos, self-guiding feedback loops) and how sound functions within these factors (how it resonates, dissipates, attracts and repels.

Materials | Delegated performance
Location | Kandos Community Centre Hall
1. Super Critical Mass (Julian Day & Luke Jaaniste), That Thing Between Us, 2017. photo Ian Hobbs
1. Super Critical Mass (Julian Day & Luke Jaaniste), That Thing Between Us, 2017. photo Ian Hobbs