Sophie Hunter "Lucretia"
Location One
This event has ended.
Sophie Hunter’s installation Lucretia is based on fragments of Benjamin Britten's opera "The Rape of Lucretia" - specifically, the image of a group of women spinning at a loom as their husbands are off waging war.
The piece extracts various elements of the opera; the singers and orchestra, the narrative, and the operatic process itself, and deconstructs and examines them devoid of their original context.
These are then rewoven to record an altogether new sonic experience - a densely knitted soundscape incorporating elements of live singing, recorded instruments and mechanical noise. Parallels are drawn between the act of weaving and the recording or ordering of information. Single threads from the visual and sound worlds combine and resign their original identity to become bound to and part of each other - assimilated into new forms and patterns.
Lucretia centers around a room made of fishing wire, illuminated by naked light bulbs. Outside the room, several monitors are placed at varying heights. They reference the whirring and clicking of the loom, the sewing machine, cogs and connectors, the telephone switchboard, the spectrum of beeps and tones that provide the soundtrack to modern technology and women’s connection and interaction with them. The women in the space operate in infinite detail; they become agents of change and controllers of information.
Myth is populated with weavers, from Penelope to Philomela. In these stories and traditions, weaving is more than a domestic pastime; it becomes a means of expression, a metaphor for survival, power and faithfulness. Weaving in essence is a recording of information, a means to encode it, a system of memory and a system of creativity. In this installation, Lucretia’s looms are transferred from the domestic sphere and changed into monitors; exacting machines capable of decoding information. Instead of pictures woven in tapestries or yarn, these women weave in a digital visual form.
Sophie Hunter has assembled an international team of collaborators from the worlds of opera, film and theatre to create the piece.
Andrew Staples – co-director; Singers: Kirsten Allegri, Valerie Kraft, Sonya Headlam, Syvlie Jensen; Performers: Justine Salata, Melissa Mizell – Lighting designer, Sarah Outhwaite – Assistant Director, Additional video editing; Poppy de Villeneuve – Original video content, John Fitzwilliam – Additional video design, Asa Wember – Additional sound design, Jacqueline Kerrod – Harp, Raphael Zinman – Production
Media
Schedule
from June 14, 2011 to June 16, 2011
Tuesday, June 14, 7 & 8pm Thursday, June 16, 8pm