Research, experiences, and various notes

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Walks 04 and 05: Grand Parade campus - St Mary de Haura church, Shoreham; Berwick train station - The Ram Inn, Glynde.

This writing is to wrap up my reflection of the optional module: Excursions in Immensity: The Shape of a Walk. My second year as a BA student has contained some difficult months, and having a very separate extra module has not made my work easier. Indeed, many times it has been easy to resent something which I had such a positive feeling towards in the beginning. Having missed a few walks, my work for the module (which took several attempts to define) relied less and less on these prescribed walks, and became more about evoking the sensation of a walk to an audience. Nonetheless, I did take part in two memorable walks in the beginning of 2018. The first of these walks saw us walk from Grand Parade campus to the seafront, where we were instructed to collect ten of something as we went: inspired by my low energy, I collected photographs of different bench designs. With calm winds that are rare for England’s south coast at this time of year, and an even calmer sea, the walk was pleasant, scenic, and greatly removed from traffic noise. In fact, other than the awkwardness of still not having much to show for this module, this may have been the nicest walk in the whole year. Our module leader also asked us to select a number under three-hundred as so to bring our attention to the range of beach hut designs scattered along the four kilometres of Brighton west of the pier. Being a lecturer in architecture, he introduced us to the various styles of holiday homes from grandiose Victorian to contemporary reactions to local landscapes and back. Most interesting for me was the sudden shifts: going from open greens and promenades of the Western Lawns, into the odious, rusting harbours at the mouth of the River Adur, and then happening upon the appealing village at the heart of Shoreham. At this point of the module however, it was safe to say that my project for this module had become stale for a second time. The last walk I embarked upon as part of the group was the toughest walk yet, and perhaps the second-most miserable form of physical endurance in my adult life. We set off from Berwick station into the perpetual drizzle, along the country roads towards Berwick proper (this was the point where I learned Berwick station, and its corresponding village were not only separate, but on opposing sides of the A27). Once we arrived in Berwick, we stopped by in the lavish interiors of St Michael and All Saints Church, before being taken through one field after another, on a public walkway towards Charleston estates. Far from the gentle stroll of our previous walk, we became weighed down with the mud collecting on our shoes, engulfed in the smell of cattle in the interspersed farms (though these provided minimal respite from the mud), and envious of the Land Rovers driving about the country estates which fell between the farms. I can say that by this time, my final idea for what I was going to be doing for the project started to emerge, particularly as every step came to be a laboured experience in itself, so despite arriving at Glynde station completely soaked through and needing an early night, the experience was ultimately the most productive one.

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Walk 06: Eastbourne Asda - Crumbles Pond

I decided to use this gentle walk with Bouchra to record more walking experiences on video. Starting with an idea to apply the audio recording of a walk to the horizon to the still image of the starting point, I recorded a few short walks, paying attention to the richness of the moving soundscape. Between the conversations of passers by, their interactions with me, the sounds of birds, dogs, and waves, I thought about how the composition of sounds I heard was unique to my location on a step-by-step basis. By the time I reached Princes Park, I had formulated another, more visual idea.

In order to capture the visual experience of walking, I returned my focus to the steps of a walk. First I selected a place where a short leisurely walk could begin and end in the same place, in this first instance Crumbles Pond in Princes Park. Then instead of simply video recording the walk, in which one normally attempts to steady the final image, I took a photo at every step, allowing the difference of each step’s perspective to be felt visually. In total, this short walk which usually takes between six and ten minutes took more than twenty minutes, and required more than eight hundred photos to complete the circular route. Next I took the walk again recording only the sound, and as could be expected, found the passers by, the obstacles, the placement of swans, and the overall experience to be entirely different. When I got back to Bouchra, I asked her to record the same walk herself, and I returned the next day to record it once more, this time with my daughter.

I explained to her that any walk at any given time was comparable to any home on any given day, in that each instance would contain its own unique story. My intention is to continue audio recording the same walk around the pond on different days, and apply the recordings, either individually, or as a mixed track, to the overactive motion of the animated photography, played to match the six to ten minutes taken to hear each step’s location.

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Excursions in Immensity: continued.

It has been a while since I have written anything about the additional module I am taking as part of the second year of my degree. Back in November, I had been working on the idea of capturing the sounds within particular spaces (parks, parking areas, various walkways) and documenting them. Simply documenting the soundscape and waiting for something to inspire an art-form seemed trite to say the least. I decided in December that I needed to forge a new path. First, I decided that the focus on the locations, and not the act of walking, was a distraction from the task, at least for me. Then the question became “how can I convey the act of walking to an audience?”. I remembered an exhibition from the Towner gallery titled A Certain Kind Of Light, which focused on the subject and material of light. The treatment of this material, particularly in sculpture and sound, sought to make the transient physical (this actually inspired my first installation around March and April 2017). This exhibition came to me as the answer to the aforementioned question, and my first thought was to work with sculptures based on terrain plus either sound coming from the objects, or video projected on to them. Quite aside from being ambitious for a side project, the issue of which terrains kept coming up, and with having so much to catch up on after being ill early on, the entire Excursions in Immensity project had to be put on the back burner.

Since the beginning of February, I have been able to commit to this two semester module, and have recorded walks between Brighton and Shoreham, and between Berwick and Glynde in photography, video, audio, and object collection. Yet still, there was nothing that was suggesting how I could convey the movement to the audience, or the impact of this and the ground to the walker. It was not until I took a more casual walk Eastbourne seafront the shifting foreground and background made me rethink for a third time what I should be doing for this project.

Towner (2017) A Certain Kind Of Light. Towner. Available at URL: http://www.townereastbourne.org.uk/exhibition/a-certain-kind-of-light/ [Accessed 25/02/18].

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Inspired by the ethno-musicology of "Latcho Drom" by Tony Gatlif, and the autobiographical nature of "Angelo My Love" directed by Robert Duvall, and following in the path of Laszlo Moholy-Nagy's "Großstadtzigeuner", I have made this short film to document my perspectives of Anglo-Romany culture growing up. My personal feeling is that against the strong historical connections portrayed by Romanies across America and the rest of Europe, and against the glamorous appeal of that other "gypsy" line, modern Irish Travellers, Anglo-Romanies are one of Britain's most misrepresented minorities. I started out seeking to do what Moholy-Nagy did in 1932; document every aspect of Romany life (but those specifically in England and Wales) including the customs, language, and music, and lack of all three. I also wanted to demonstrate the love for family, the violence, and persecution felt in common with Romanies in other countries. Following an interview among family, however, the film became a way of documenting the state and decline of Anglo-Romany lifestyles today. "Mandi Velled to Puv the Gry" - Performed by myself, is the extent of Romany music known to most in Britain today. "Don't Be Cruel" - Performed by Robert Stewart, demonstrates the long-term enthusiasm for mixing of cultures often missed in media portrayals of Romanies. "Jelem Jelem" - Performed by myself, is the national anthem of Romanies, and is set against the demise of cultural identity taking place in the country today. Poetry comes from "Hidy-Hole and the Inner Sanctum" by Andrew Kötting, which ponders the nature of "home", and whose film style had a big influence on some of my editing choices.

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An analysis of Cultural Musical Codes used in the film ‘Angelo My Love’.

Of the various layers of sound in film, music may be recognised as being the least organic (Gorbman, 1987). Often it plays seemingly from nowhere, and the characters in the plot rarely react to it (Buhler, 2001). However, it was present in cinema long before recorded dialogue (Gorbman, 1987), and is recognised as an emotionally and psychologically manipulative layer (Gorbman, 1987). In her book Unheard Melodies, Claudia Gorbman (1987) details certain conventions of music in western cinema. Prominent among these conventions are three types of musical cue that are used to situate the audience’ perception to tell the story better (Gorbman, 1987). Pure Musical Codes draw attention to the music itself; Cultural Musical Codes place a character, location, or story within a societal, political, or historical context; and Cinematic Musical Codes refers to music that has been placed to draw attention to the plot or a visual occurrence, or denote the emotion of a scene or character (Gorbman, 1987). She also describes how music in film can be diegetic, meaning that its source is contained within the world being portrayed, or nondiegetic, when the music is added to enhance the scene (Gorbman, 1987). While Gorbman placed focus on Cinematic Musical Codes in an analysis of its cinematic impact, I want to draw attention to how observing Cultural Musical Codes can create a deeper understanding of a film, particularly when the culture depicted is different to that of the audience. After I introduce the film, I will analyse examples of music placed for cultural significance.

Angelo My Love (1983), a film which follows the life of Romanies in New York through the eyes of eight-year-old Angelo, is directed and produced by actor Robert Duvall, who spent five years and more than one million dollars on the project (Herb, 1983), and displays some unusual decisions in the context of cinema. Except for four supplementary actors (Bogre, 1981), the cast was made up of New York Romanies, many of whom were illiterate (Rusted, 1984), playing dramatised versions of themselves within a story that Duvall wrote, inspired by their lifestyle and beliefs (Rusted, 1984). Duvall was also more interested in observing behaviour than having a polished Hollywood movie, and allowed the Romany cast to improvise their way through the plot (Rusted, 1984). Thirdly, the film is shot with a loose cinema verité style (Rusted, 1984), using handheld cameras with camera shakes left in (Bogre, 1981), a mixture of paces, and minimal additional lighting, with cinematographer Joseph Friedman remarking that he was worried the cast would have quit with the extra heat (Bogre, 1981). Various quotes from Friedman and Duvall, highlight the difficulties of enthusing the stars in the project (Bogre 1981), and this explains the pace and visual style. Duvall spent a long time learning from the community and gaining their trust before being approached about the film (Bogre, 1981), while Friedman had to utilise his background in documentaries; “If it took me too many takes to get my moves right […] the gypsies would get annoyed and leave” (Bogre, 1981). Despite this, Duvall remarks that “gypsies make great actors because they take advantage of everything around them” (Bogre, 1981).

               With the difficulties with filming and logistics, the practice of music being added later could have worked in favour of music editor and composer Michael Kamen. However, between television themes, drunken singing, and procession’s hymns, along with a combined seventeen minutes of live musicians being used, and a further seven reused elsewhere, much of the music in Angelo My Love comes from a diegetic source. Further still, much of this comes from the cast described above; most of the Romanies sing or play instruments with skill and enthusiasm. Duvall has again made use of their eagerness to perform, but now as musicians. Throughout the film, many of these performances construe either Greek or Russian connotations. While this provides significant Cultural Musical Codes for a non-Romany audience trying to place the characters’ history, or determine who is from which family, it is the references to popular American music that shows the polarity between American and Romany cultures that Angelo feels subjected to. These instances, also diegetic, come from the nightclubs and restaurants the children charm their way into, or from the television shows Angelo is drawn to. When observed as the foreign culture, the inclusion of disco, country, and show tunes remind the audience of Angelo’s impressionable age, and give clues about his main flaw from the perspective of his family; his impossible desire to be both Romany and non-Romany. Where Kamen has composed additional music, he has used exotic and unusual instrumentation to strengthen this contrast, with panpipes, and traditional Greek and Russian instruments set against disco, church organs, and glass bottles.

               An analysis of Cultural Musical Codes used in Angelo My Love could be used as an overview of the film. The opening nightclub scene with its disco music, infused with accents of Greek guitar places a Western audience in familiar territory while alerting them to strangers in their midst. The next time Angelo attends an American music venue is to watch a country band, nearer the end of the film, but this time without added Greek or Romany tones. Musically, this contrasts with most of the music found in this film, but this scene also shows Angelo at his most accepting of the culture outside of his own. The last live performance features two opera singers in a restaurant that Angelo and his sister Debbie have snuck into. The inclusion of Mario Lanza’s Golden Days in the last few minutes of the film seems to fit Gorbman’s definition of Pure and Cinematic Musical Codes more than a Cultural one, but the reactions between the siblings reminds us of their cultural distance nonetheless.

Twelve minutes into the film, Angelo and his older brother Michael escape from school to a sudden burst of frenetic guitars playing the “i-VII-VI-V” chord progression typical of flamenco music (Thompson, 1985). The energy of this music performed by Romanies Johnny and Steve Mitchell live in the following scene, and used again during the end credits serves this scene as a Cinematic Musical Code as much as a Cultural one. It shows the background of the brothers as much as it does the adrenaline behind their actions. Perhaps unwittingly though, Duvall’s decision to invite the Romanies to play their music documents the historical reach of their nomadic lifestyle. The Greek Romany portion of the cast firmly identify as such, and not in any way as Spanish (Angelo rebukes his teacher’s question of whether he is Spanish early in the film), and the rhythm fits Hungarian estam music much more than flamenco (Rombase, 2003). This reinforces the theory that the chord progression was carried from Greece, or from further east by Romany musicians (Thompson, 1985). Kamen uses this progression later in the film when the brothers visit the Basilica of Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré for the saint’s feast, but using an organ and panpipes. In using their favoured progression, Kamen implies the presence of the Romanies in a church, while the panpipes suggest the unfamiliarity between them and their location.

               In Duvall’s effort to document the lives of New York Romanies, he invited them to use their language freely. Romany lyrics celebrate melancholy similarly to blues and fado songs, and this is showcased in the song performed by Johnny and Steve Mitchell early in the film, and during the credits. The subtitles translate a small excerpt as such:

              Mama, the cops took my brothers away               My two brothers are lying in prison               That’s why I cry this way               Go, my pony, go go, my pony               Oh, Get me down to town

It could be surprising from an American perspective to be found in the song eight-year-old Angelo makes up in the bathroom, as the subtitles read:

               A big shame it would be                Mother would cry over me                That I would leave home                No, I’ll never marry a gaji                No, I’ll never marry a gaji

The Romanies’ fatalistic lyrics match those found in Anglo-Romany songs of the British Isles, which suggests a common perspective of suppression and isolation exists (Allum, 2010) (Vulliamy, 2012). Whether Gorbman’s writings about filmmakers using stock music and compositional conventions is still true or not (Gorbman, 1985), by inviting the filmed family to sing their own songs, Duvall has found a creative circumvention of the cliché.

               The skilled musicality of the Romany community is evident throughout the film. As the antagonist Patalay make his escape to Canada, he coerces his sister Millie to sing along with his traditional pop, and when they reach the Russian campsite, their arrival is celebrated with singing late into the night. Michael’s wedding sees the Greek Romany families performing kalamatianos and hasapiko music and dances; and even Angelo’s father, who is less present throughout the film (Canby, 1983), can be seen watching a war news broadcast, becoming bored, and begin drumming enthusiastically on the television to the military trumpets. Against the comfort the Romanies create for themselves in music, Kamen’s additions of Russian woodwinds and Greek strings in exotic scales sometimes stand out as being unnatural. He succeeds in signifying characters, locations, and parts of the plot as both Cinematic and Cultural Musical Codes, and in the dream scene where Patalay succumbs to his alcoholism, Kamen’s use of various glass bottles to create dream-like chimes and wind sounds as Patalay dances around with the whiskey bottle is perhaps the most captivating scene to not be accompanied by diegetic music. Ultimately though, it is Duvall’s attempts to draw out the performers hidden in this unlikely cast that gives the film’s soundtrack its overall expression.

               Angelo My Love through Gorbman’s perspective of Cultural Musical Codes would reveal more about the film than might be observed initially, or less objectively. However, doing so reveals as much about the concept that Gorbman writes about. With only one film being analysed, it has been revealed that when a diegetic piece of music is heard, the meaning can be different based on which person the audience experiences it. The audience who listens explicitly to the music could be receiving enjoyment from the placement of Pure Musical Codes, whereas the audience who considers how characters feel upon hearing the same music may gain deeper understanding of the film through the placement of Cinematic Musical Codes. Both may look at the plot of the film thus far, and tie this diegetic music in with the time, character, or location and appreciate the Cultural Musical Codes that a knowledgeable composer or director has displayed. Knowledge of all levels of a film is most important to the filmmaker using music; rarely will a piece of music just refer to one musical code. This film analysis reveals that knowledge of musical styles, origins, and theory is important in film too. Using culture as an example, the visual aspect of an immersive film revealing a time and location demands matching music if any is to be used. In the case of Angelo My Love, Duvall’s use of the Romanies’ talent as musicians enchants a film wrought with visual problems. While this is not a solution every filmmaker can use, a lesson that is worth considering is that factors surrounding the filming, such as location, time, age, and background of people being shot could provide the most natural solutions.

Allum, Dan. (2010) Atching Tan (script). BBC. 11 January 2018.

“Angelo My Love”. (1983) Dir. Robert Duvall,

Bogre, Michelle. (1981) “The Filming of Angelo My Love”. American Cinematographer 62.7. ProQuest. 10 January 2018.

Buhler, James. (2001) “Analytical and Interpretive Approaches to Film Music (II): Analysing Interaction of Music and Film”. Film Music. Ed. K. J. Donnelly. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Canby, Vincent. (1983) “ ‘Angelo My Love’, Duvall Tale of Gypsies”. New York Times. Web. 11 January 2018.

Gorbman, Claudia. (1987) Unheard Melodies: Narrative Film Music. London: BFI Publishing.

Herb. (1983) “Angelo, My Love”, Variety. CineFiles. 9 January 2018.

Mandi went to puv the Grai. traditional verse. Gloucestershire Traditions. Web. http://glostrad.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/394-Wiggy-Smith-Mandi-went-to-puv-the-grai.pdf . 11 January 2018.

Rombase. (2003) “The Music of the Roma in Hungary”. Web. 11 January 2018.

Rusted, Brian. (1984) “Review” (of Angelo My Love). The Journal of American Folklore 97.384. JSTOR. 10 January 2018.

Thompson, Barbara. (1985) “Flamenco: A Tradition in Evolution”. The World of Music 27.3. JSTOR. 11 January 2018.

Vulliamy, Ed. (2012) “Sam Lee: There is a difference in the songs Gypsies sing”. The Guardian. Web. Guardian. 11 January 2018.

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Laszlo Moholy-Nagy - Großstadtzigeuner

Laszlo Moholy-Nagy - Großstadtzigeuner (Urban Gypsies) - filmed in April 1932, and both excerpts from the original 11 minutes video. Judging by what Robin Curtis (2003) has written in his article, The Stranger in a City Filled With Strangers: Moholy-Nagy’s “Urban Gypsies”, these are both certainly taken from the Bauhaus version of the film (note that children appear early on). 

Moholy-Nagy seems to have begun filming out of a developing interest in the Roma and Sinti camps positioned near Berlin in April 1933. It has captured something that fits together with my own experience and knowledge, even from a modern Anglo-Romany perspective. There is the sense of bipolar pull between the freedom and fear, community and exclusivity, and of course, the question of how much integration with gorgias should be practised. Indeed, Sybil Moholy-Nagy gives the impression that her husband had a great task in winning support in the camps outside Berlin before he could be allowed to film them, and especially their children (Curtis, 2003). In what Curtis has written, it does seem that Sybil has developed some negative opinions about the subjects from her assisting with this film before and after the death of Laszlo. As mentioned before, the above videos are most likely extracted from what is known as the Bauhaus version (the less cut down version available in the Bauhaus archives). The other version was produced by the Chronos production company and is thus dubbed the Chronos version. The latter, edited together with new sound in nineteen-seventy-one, also contains a notion of chronology (Curtis, 2003), particularly telling a more ethnographic story of Moholy-Nagy having to gradually gain the trust of the clan. Curtis adds that this interpretation does not seem correct as many of the elements of the story do not correlate (children and parents being seen together; fights being directed between family members rather than towards him). Overall, I prefer the way the Bauhaus version is conducted, and the two videos I have included here, particularly the one from Youtube with its movement from joy to violence and back again, just give good documentation of life in Romany camps. What I would really love to know right now, is what did the music and voices contained on the original recordings sound like?

Curtis, R (2003) “The Stranger in a City Filled With Strangers: Moholy-Nagy’s “Urban Gypsies” “, Framework: The Journal of Cinema and Media, Vol. 44, No. 2, Cinematic Images of Romanies. Drake Stutesman; Wayne State University Press [Online] Available at URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41552368 [Accessed 15/12/2017].

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Walk 03: Wembley Arena - Ibis hotel Wembley 28/10/2017

This was not exactly the walk I planned on taking in London as part of the Excursions in Immensity project, but nonetheless, it was as rich in experience as any other. Taken as part of a late night commute between a rock concert and our hotel, I decided to record the audio of the brief journey for use in later projects. With wanting to take it easy with Bouchra who was coming down with the flu, and being unsure of what I was looking for in my walks since visiting La Jardin des Plantes, it seemed apt to concentrate on how the sounds of my journey changed over the brief time. The above image of the journey does not capture as much of the development over time as the relative audio recording does. The change from hundreds of men shouting over each other, to entering our hotel room in near silence could be used to subjectively tell a story of seeking salvation, or ending up alone. Treated separately, they could be used in film to provide two very different scenes with ambient layers. Commuting from one point to another is certainly a journey that most take more often than any stroll, ramble, or dérive. For me personally and I suspect, many artists, this mode of walking is not the first to be thought of creatively, yet may be the most personal. Bouchra studied the personal aspects of commuting in her Familiar Territory work; the resulting book revealed a build up of memories made during repetitive journeys, from fragmented instants to years of experiences folding over each other. I believe that the personal aspect of commuting, especially that which takes place in our daily lives, is the most pertinent part to focus on. This is not to say that rambling and strolling are not as personal as modes of walking, indeed they betray the walkers’ decision making process, but where an action lacks such decisions does not mean it need lack the same analysis.

Fadil, B. (2015) Familiar Territory, self-published. Google Maps (2017) Map of Wembley walk route. Scale unknown [Online] Available at URL: https://www.google.co.uk/maps [Accessed 02/11/17].

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Walk 02: Gare d’Austerlitz - La Ménagerie du Jardin des Plantes 25/10/2017

For my walk around Paris, I wanted to continue any one of the aspects of the previous journey around Brighton. By this I mean that I considered walking the islands with its significance as the origins of the city (Dailey & Gerrard, 2011); or Montmartre with its similar history of hilltop agriculture resisting the expanding city (Hawkins, 2010). On a previous visit, we walked la Promenade Plantée from near Place de la Bastille to Boulevard Peripherique, and with its comparative drop in sound from tourist bustle to near isolation, it would have seemed ideal. What I decided to find in Paris, however, was a location of greenery and quietness contained within the main city, as opposed to an escape to outside it. Searching for a quiet place in Montmartre, perhaps north of Sacré Cœur, or strolling a park would be sufficient, and with the short time we had left, the latter seemed a nicer way to spend the day. If there is one difference that I might place a focus on, it is the purpose someone would have in taking these journeys, with the first walk used to introduce a class to a concept, Bouchra found La Ménagerie du Jardin des Plantes as a family day out. The garden itself was sizeable, and likely calmer than elsewhere in Paris. While not as long as Walk 01, I was able to collect ample audio and photographic evidence from the short walk from Gare d’Austerlitz to La Ménagerie (seen above in the blue line). During the later walk (red line), many of the Parisian school-children had left, replaced by parents and younger children, and the gardens became a spot for locals to relax. If nothing else, the common element of my last two walks is that the locations are both used by locals to escape overwhelming urbanity.

Dailey, D. & Gerrard, M. (2011) Top 10 Paris. London: Dorling Kindersley.

Google Maps (2017) Map of Brighton walk route. Scale unknown [Online] Available at https://www.google.co.uk/maps [Accessed 28/10/17].

Hawkins, S. (ed.) (2010) AA Key guide Paris. Basingstoke: AA Media Limited.

Krull, M. (2014) “La Promenade Plantée”, Cool Stuff in Paris [Online] Available at URL: http://www.coolstuffinparis.com/bat_watching_promenade_plantee.php [Accessed 27/10/17].

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Walk 01: Moulsecoomb Campus - Hollingbury Hillfort - Grand Parade Campus 10/10/2017

This walk took place as part of the first session of the Excursions in Immensity “options” module at the University of Brighton.  We began at the initial meeting place of Moulsecoomb campus, and set out across the road and back towards the station I had come from earlier that morning. The first notable quality of crossing Lewes Road, Brighton’s main artery to the east, and moving up the hill past Moulsecoomb station, is the settling contrast between urbanity and isolating woodland. These hills to the north of Brighton, that I had considered to just be the lungs of Brighton, existent for dog walkers and air quality, held many hidden locations: schools for children with special educational needs, hospitals for those who struggled to cope with societal norms, institutions for teenagers with behaviour issues. Essentially, the hills separate more than just Brighton’s geographical areas, and from the perspective of the institutions, the reason is obvious: the visual and aural qualities here can easily make one believe they have left the city altogether. It is quiet, fresh, natural, and could be considered soothing. It is also lonely and distant. This is where the locally famous “babes in the woods” murder victims were found, and where caravans are often pitched illegally. At the top of the hill, it was revealed that we were standing on top of an iron age castle, built here for the range of views projecting over the South Downs valleys. Indeed, from here, Falmer campus, and the surrounding major roads can be seen clearly, and the coast from Peacehaven to Worthing is visible. Also notable from here is the massive sprawl of houses which sprang up early last century before urban development laws were introduced. As our leader said, the rushed nature of these builds is apparent by their location at the bottom of the valley; something the iron age neighbours would have deemed as poor logic. Following a walk along the castle walls, we split up, and I made my way south to Grand Parade with a few other students, noting along the way the descent into the working class neighbourhoods of north Brighton. I soon reached Hollingdean Road, and with that, the aural impacts of the city’s traffic returned. Our module leader, Stephen Ryan, takes great pride in his knowledge gained through these walks, and his critical reception of society, history, architecture, geology, and acoustics assures me that this module will be every bit as enthused as I hope it to be. The volume of literature he suggest is enormous, though London Orbital by Iain Sinclair is one book we already own, and Psychogeography by Will Self is another Bouchra is familiar with. Stephen has stated that he is looking into creating an exhibition of this module’s work from this year and the last, and he was surprised to see a sound artist in his roster. I hope to meet his enthusiasm for the subject and provide something that he claims he has not seen yet; a fulfilling piece of sound art based in walking various landscapes. At this point in time, it is most likely that I will be observing and documenting the aforementioned transformation of soundscapes between cities and the parks and woodlands contained well within their boundaries.

Carder, T. (2010) “Hollingbury ‘Castle’” Tim’s 2010 tour of Brighton and Hove. [Online] Available at URL: http://www.mybrightonandhove.org.uk/page_id__10016_path__0p114p389p794p.aspx [Accessed 19/10/17].

Google Maps (2017) Map of Brighton walk route. Scale unknown [Online] Available at https://www.google.co.uk/maps [Accessed 19/10/17]

Self, W. (2007) Psychogeography, London: Bloomsbury.

Sinclair, I. (2002) London Orbital, London: Penguin.

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Walking towards art. The art of walking.

Art is a relatively new endeavour for me, something I have only been interested in witnessing since about ten years ago, discussing for half of that time, and considered making in the last three years. However, this is likely because my knowledge of it as a child stretched as far as Monet’s Water-Lilies. The only things I remember as a secondary school student is three months learning to draw accurately cans of paint, and more enticingly, how to recreate Henry Moore’s range of textures in biro pens. The point is, my education and exposure to art was hardly inspirational or relatable. This might sound unusual to some, but in hindsight I wonder “what if we had been taught art theory?”

Every experience ends up feeding into who I am. My background travelling on circuses, and nostalgic wanderlust instilled a love of geography early on. My social awkwardness, early behaviour issues, later depressive years, and difference from the rest of my Anglo-Romany family made me want to understand how people develop as individuals. One day, when I was feeling uninspired by any of my own thoughts or the course I was on, I Google searched “psychology and geography” expecting to find something of how I felt; an analysis of wanderlust, or an explanation of how one can somehow feel culturally and linguistically trapped on the world’s eighth largest island. Instead I found Psychogeography, and with it the Situationists. Like Durkheim, Bourdieu (whose Cultural Capital I will happily write about one day), and Passeron; Guy Debord became another French philosopher who still inspires. More than that, the Marxist tones appealed to me. Since reading Cultural Capital, I started to see the world around me as a capitalist construction for control. More than the Situationist philosophy however, seeing the art of Psychogeography was the first time I felt that I could make art. One of my earliest memories was teaching myself to read road maps. My first job involved walking the streets and Lanes of Brighton for ten hours a day. A favourite hobby during my reclusive years was rambling the woods and hills around Heathfield, East Sussex. One might think Dérives were an art-form that was created for me, but like so many interesting projects, it has not happened yet. Later during Bouchra’s second year on her Foundation Diploma at college, she came home explaining that she had a new module called Psychogeography. I do not think she shared in the same enthusiasm as I did, but it was during this module that Bouchra started screen-printing and settled her sights on the Fine Art: Printmaking course at the University of Brighton. And despite the rushed manner with which this surprise module was delivered, Bouchra based her finale to the course on it with her Familiar Territory series and book. To date, this is my favourite work of hers.

Above: Double page spread from Bouchra’s Psychogeography research diary detailing a walk around Montmartre taken by Bouchra and myself during our lune de miel.

Since then, Bouchra and I began our separate art degrees, and while Bouchra has continued the theme of journeys into her current art, it is much less in the physical sense. I, on the other hand, was introduced to the World Soundscape Project’s notion of soundwalks early on as a method to explore and compose with a soundscape. To me, a soundwalk is not very different from a dérive except for a conscious emphasis on listening is used to navigate. The ensuing electroacoustic assignment gave me the extrinsic motivation to finally compose a track based on walking. The walk I took was around Eastbourne’s Sovereign Harbour; somewhere close to home, but full of contrasting industrial locks and blithe restaurants at all times of year. I conducted the soundwalk in November last year (2016), and between periods of strong wind typical of la Manche, the sounds I gathered were reminiscent of going from a town square in the height of summer, to an industrial foundry, and back again quickly. These sounds inspired a kind of narrative, and parts with gently slapping water and herring gulls actually made me think of the night theme of the island in Animal Crossing: New Leaf. What came about was a rather messy five minutes, with three main sections meaning to represent a turbulent story with a calm beginning, and jovial ending. The improvised ukulele and guitar instrumental provides a nice accompaniment for the first ninety seconds, but that is where the positives end. The production quality is not my finest, the middle goes on for too long (I did unwittingly use a minimalist technique here though), and the ending has very little input from me. I will post a link here, if only to serve as a point of reference of how much I have improved.

https://soundcloud.com/dan-fadil/coastal-scene

Now I am in my second year student at the University of Brighton, I have been given an options module to complete. I received my first choice: Excursions in Immensity: the Shape of a Walk, equally based in Dérives and soundwalks, but also exploring social commentary, geography, history, and political rights, and all the creations stemming from it, from land art to literature. The reason I selected this module was not to continue soundwalks per se, but so I could have a framework try to create something richer, deeper, and more researched than what went before. Last Tuesday, I went to my first session, and walked from Moulescombe campus to Hollingbury Hillfort, and then down to Grand Parade campus. I will write about that experience if I have time before this weekend. If not I will first write about walks of similar purpose I plan on taking in Paris and London next week, and then I will write about that journey.

Bourdieu, P. (1986) “The Forms of Capital” in J.E. Richardson (ed) Handbook of Theory of Research for the Sociology of Education (1986). California: Greenwood Press. 241-258. Translated by Richard Nice [online] Available at URL: https://faculty.georgetown.edu/irvinem/theory/Bourdieu-Forms-of-Capital.pdf [Accessed 17/10/17].

Debord, G. (1958) “Theory of the Dérive” in Ken Knabb (ed) Situationist International Anthology (2006). California: AK Press. Available at URL: http://www.bopsecrets.org/SI/2.derive.htm [Accessed 17/10/17].

Fadil, B. (2016) Familiar Territory, self-published.

Schafer, R. (1994) The Soundscape, Vermont: Destiny Books.

[danfadil]

William Kentridge - More Sweetly Play The Dance. Performed at the EYE Filmmuseum, Amsterdam, 2015. Uploaded by Lars Svanholm.

[danfadil]

Where are contemporary Anglo-Romanies in art?

I want to make clear before I continue that there is an historic and cultural distinction to be made between Anglo-Romanies and Irish Travellers. Though both appeared in the British Isles at a similar time, Anglo-Romanies are a branch of a larger, more ancient sect stemming from North India and influenced by the Jewish, Russian, and Greek cultures they travelled through. Further analysis distinguishes Romanies in other parts of Europe from Anglo-Romanies, particularly in the loss of language. Anglo-Romany cannot pretend to be a full language, but rather a collection of nouns, common verbs, and occasional adjectives propped up by English. I use “Anglo-Romany” and “Romany” where I am being specific or general respectively. Irish Travellers came from Ireland, and were originally farmers and smiths (known to themselves at the time as Tinkers, though this is now seen by their progeny as offensive) who, increasingly persecuted by the ruling English elected to a hidden, tax-free life on the road. The two types of British Traveller have mixed a small amount over the generations, but have managed to maintain their own identities.

I have ideas for apps and documentaries on the migration of musical forms and influences of Romanies, installations showing the lifestyles, language, and soundscapes of Anglo-Romany camps, and albums capturing traditional Romany music still available in the U.K.. To this day, I have not started any project about this culture, and it is not something I usually am associated with by Gorgias, because I usually choose not to associate myself with it: For all of its romance, it is violent, stubborn, and in many ways, not destined to survive because its members are always looking back. Nonetheless, I find the lack of Anglo-Romanies’ presence in art to be baffling; Romanies have a history of wanting to keep (particularly women) to their own culture, but Anglo-Romanies (I cannot speak for those in other countries) are proud of their culture and will demonstrate it openly if they feel they are being respected.  As of the Caravan Sites and Control Development act of nineteen-sixty (The National Archives, n.d.), the writing was on the wall for all Anglo-Romanies, and the legislation pertaining council run traveller sites and comparative freedoms allowed to travelling showmen did not satisfy everybody. Even less so as time has gone by, with the sites becoming sources of local and national scorn, and with circuses and funfairs becoming modernised in technology and professionalism. Inevitably, Anglo-Romany traditions are going to be extinct, most likely with the demise of my father’s generation, and there is interest from academics, notably The University of Manchester’s Romani Project, in preserving or documenting what little is left. Incorporated into the School of Arts, Languages and Cultures there, I may be surprised by what has been produced there and dismissing Anglo-Romany representation in the arts out of hand, but like much of this part of me, it is not something I have committed myself enough with to make the pilgrimage, yet.

 The National Archives (n.d.) Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960, legislation.gov.uk [online] Available at URL:http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/Eliz2/8-9/62 [Accessed 12/10/2017].

[danfadil]

Reception of culture-specific music in media.

While I was finishing up the last restful weeks of summer, trying not to panic about the approaching new academic year, Bouchra had been getting pushing her animation work further, and discovered the wonderful More Sweetly Play the Dance by William Kentridge (2015). Witnessing this work over her shoulder left me with much to think about: In one sense, I had not considered the use of sound art as a narrative device, and in another sense, the approach of using video art, performance art, charcoal drawings, shadow-puppetry, and recorded music reminded me of the multi-media Happenings of Allan Kaprow. Something about using so many aural, visual, and cultural stimuli engages the ears, eyes, and mind in a way more akin to life itself. However, this mode of working, and indeed Kaprow’s Happenings are something I will inevitably come back to. What was most prominent for me was the music, played by The African Immanuel Essemblies Brass Band (Kentridge, 2015). As the fourteen minutes of the work go by visually, the sound of each instrument, together with their respective parts of the composition are phased in and out. Going between cacophony and silence, brooding and jovial, melodic and droning. Meanwhile, the characters in this long procession march, dance, shuffle, and drag their way across eight large screens portraying various parts of South Africa’s history. Kentridge had found the song while looking for music which represented South Africa on Youtube, and sent out people from his studio to find the band who played the original recording (Kentridge, 2015).

“They came from Sebokeng, an hour’s journey from Johannesburg. It is both their image and their music that goes through the film” (Kentridge, 2015).

Reading his book from front to back, it seems to me that the origin of the band influenced the final product’s imagery, with Kentridge basing the landscape on the flat mining areas, burnt grass, and empty billboards of Johannesburg (Kentridge, 2015). To me the musical choice on the part of the artist seems at once fitting and unusual. As the soundtrack to the tumultuous political events of South Africa, the sound of a brass band does seem more in place in Northern Europe or New Orleans, though the composition itself is reminiscent of more traditional South African chants. Together with the images of politicians at podiums, and criers calling through megaphones, the connotations of propaganda, that all is well amongst the apartheid, violence, and famine, is apparent. I will revisit More Sweetly Play the Dance again another time analysing the multi-projected film element.

 Film sound has come up as the prime focus for this semester, and while not conventionally designed for use in fine art I am interested in learning the techniques for use in video art projects. Much of my class has more experience in this area than I do, but during my Alternatural work from earlier this year, I worked visuals together with a track made up of recordings of metal found in the local environment. This involved making visual cues to line up various markings with corresponding sounds; nonetheless, I need to push myself into learning these techniques. I am currently reading Sound Design by David Sonnenschein (2001), and want to find time this month to apply the techniques within to an unknown radio play script, so as not to have any mental imagery or particular voices influencing me, and allow myself the opportunity to create the aural world from scratch myself. This led me to looking for radio play scripts on the BBC website, where I was drawn by title alone to one play called Atching Tan by Dan Allum. As the first script I was drawn to and looked at, I was surprised to find it was about a Romany family in England. My ideas generally seem to come from, or end up heading towards this formative part of my life; something I will talk about in my next post. In Dan Allum’s Atching Tan, a main focus of the story seems to centre on the protaganist, Lovvie’s, love of singing. Allum seems to have researched the pseudo-language considerably, and the original play was “recorded on location on a Traveller site, with all Traveller parts cast from the Traveller community” (BBC, 2017). This has led to much of the singing being done in Anglo-Romany. The first song Lovvie sings is neither one I have heard of, nor one I can find elsewhere on the internet, but Allum has provided translations in the script where songs are sung, and it fits with the one Anglo-Romany song I am familiar with. A favourite with my Dad Mandi Velled to Puv the Grai has all the tone and bounce of a traditional English nursery rhyme, but lyrically it is about persecution and violence. The same them is contained in Lovvie’s song in Atching Tan. I look forward to hearing this song, as Anglo-Romany has never produced anything as famous, influential, or romanticised as Wallonia’s Django Reinhardt, or Andalusia’s Flamenco genre.

 The artist who has led me to reconsider what I think of film sound and its use in fine art recently is Mikhail Karikis, a lecturer in Fine Art: Performance at my own university. Like the other works talked about here, many films and installations of Karikis centre on collaboration with communities. It is hard to say which film has the most relevance in terms of culture-specific music and sounds, but The Politics of Love: An Audio Library (2017), part of a show about the Summer of Love 1967 is a good place to start. 

“A convivial, green, orange and grey wooden amphitheatre next to windows overlooking the absurdly blue sea, it’s a communal place to sit, talk, play records from a selection released in 1967 and read a selection of books by Roland Barthes, Simone de Beauvoir, Luce Irigaray and others on the subject of love.” (Higgie, 2017).

The vinyl records and books contained in this installation not only represent the media and air of optimism coming out of San Francisco at the celebrated time; it also represents the migration of hippies to the Greek islands, and sets up a juxtaposed backdrop for an island which in recent years has been the first European land reached by thousands fleeing war (Higgie, 2017). The presence of American Hippy culture in Greece at this time also contrasted heavily with the Junta uprising and military regime controlling the country. According to Karikis, each day a different record and book would be taken away from the room so that the sense of censorship increased, representing the freedoms being stripped from Greek citizens. This subtraction of culture-specific music is perhaps a more effective concept than having it there in the first place.

 In my view of each of these works, the connecting factor is that music can provide a level of cultural context and narrative to art that incidental sounds so rarely do. The purposefulness on an increased scale is openly received by a larger audience than what is typically heard in contemporary sound art. Even music that is unheard of in the country where the art is displayed still has some of the same impact. People recognise melodies, singing, instrumentation, and tie it together with what they are emotionally tuned to themselves. This seems like a route into an idea I had a year ago to use mainstream style music itself as a medium for fine art.

 BBC (2017) Atching Tan, Afternoon Drama, [online] Available at URL: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00w1zlr [Accessed 12/10/17]

Higgie, J. (2017) Summer of Love, Frieze.com [online] Available at URL: https://frieze.com/article/summer-love-0 [Accessed 12/10/17]

Karikis, M. (2017) Mikhail Karikis [online] Available at URL: www.mikhailkarikis.com [Accessed 12/10/2017]

Kentridge, W. (2015) More Sweetly Play the Dance, Amsterdam: nai010.

Sonnenschein, D. (2001) Sound Design, California: Michael Wiese Productions.

[danfadil]

Research. Experiences. Odd notes. Thoughts.

If you reached here you’ve reached the beginning. In this state, I am a second year student at the University of Brighton on the Digital Music and Sound Arts degree.

Heretofore, I made so many decisions to document in categories my annoyances; my sociological, philosophical, or art related thoughts; my research; my work; even my attempts of learning languages and instruments, or favourite recipes. The blogs and wasted books I have gone through…  Well, here is another, but with a stronger motivation: To be prolific as an artist and a person, I must document and reflect on everything in my creative life. With that (in need of editing) mantra, I will continue.