Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-03T08:41:32.648Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Sound-based Brutalism: An emergent aesthetic

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2016

Mo H. Zareei ,
Dugal Mckinnon ,
Dale A. Carnegie  and
Ajay Kapur
Mo H. Zareei*
Affiliation:
Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand School of Music/School of Engineering and Computer Science, PO Box 600, Wellington 6140, New Zealand
Dugal Mckinnon*
Affiliation:
Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand School of Music/School of Engineering and Computer Science, PO Box 600, Wellington 6140, New Zealand
Dale A. Carnegie*
Affiliation:
Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand School of Music/School of Engineering and Computer Science, PO Box 600, Wellington 6140, New Zealand
Ajay Kapur*
Affiliation:
California Institute of the Arts, The Herb Alpert School of Music, 24700 McBean Parkway, Valencia, California 91355, USA
*
Emails: [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]
Emails: [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]
Emails: [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]
Emails: [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Cold, stripped-down, monochrome, pixelated, iterative, quantised, grid, pulse, glitch, noise: taken together, these words imply a growing aesthetic connection within a body of experimental and independent (or non-academic) sound-based artworks produced in the past few decades. Although realised in different mediums and belonging to different artistic categories, such works are connected through a certain aesthetic sensibility. Nevertheless, since the majority of these works have thus far received little scholarly attention, a framing discussion of the aesthetic principles and features that link them is overdue. This article examines this emergent phenomenon, accounting for the particular aesthetic features that connect such sound-based artworks, arguing for a more specific terminology to adequately account for this aesthetic across the various practices in which it is observed. Rejecting ‘minimalist’ as a descriptor, this article calls for an aesthetic frame of reference derived through Brutalism, understood as a crystallisation of key features of modernism and its various movements. The first author’s work is presented as a conscious effort to create sound art redolent of Brutalism, locating this work in the context of the revival of Brutalism in recent years, which, as will be argued, can be expanded to works from a wide range of contemporary artists and musicians.

Type
Articles
Information
Organised Sound , Volume 21 , Special Issue 1: Style and Genre in Electroacoustic Music , April 2016 , pp. 51 - 60
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ashline, W. L. 2002. Clicky Aesthetics: Deleuze, Headphonics, and the Minimalist Assemblage of ‘Aberrations’. Strategies: Journal of Theory, Culture & Politics 15(1): 87–101.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Banham, R. 1966. The New Brutalism: Ethic or Aesthetic?. London: Architectural Press.Google Scholar
Banham, R. 2011. The New Brutalism. October 136: 19–28. Reprinted from Architectural Review (December 1955): 354–61.Google Scholar
Beanland, C. 2014. Concrete Buildings: Brutalist Beauty. The Independent, 14 January. www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features/concrete-buildings-brutalist-beauty-9057223.html (accessed 22 December 2014).Google Scholar
Bender, O. 2008. Interview by Tony Myatt. New Aesthetics in Computer Music. www.music.york.ac.uk/mrc/na-cm/index.php?n=Main.OlafBender (accessed 26 February 2015).Google Scholar
Berger, R. 2013. Coliseum Memorial. In Brutalism. CLOG.Google Scholar
Bernier, N. 2012. Works: Frequencies (a). Nicolas Bernier. www.nicolasbernier.com/page/works.htm (accessed 24 March 2015).Google Scholar
Bernier, N. 2014. Interview by with the Artist Nicolas Bernier. LABoral Centro de Arte. www.laboralcentrodearte.org/en/files/2013/bloglaboral/entrevista-al-artista-canadiense-nicolas-bernier/view (accessed 9 April 2015).Google Scholar
Borthwick, B. 2003. The Perfect Strom. The Wire 238: 40–47.Google Scholar
Calder, B. 2016. Raw Concrete. London: William Heinemann.Google Scholar
Cascone, K. 2000. The Aesthetics of Failure: ‘Post-Digital’ Tendencies in Contemporary Computer Music. Computer Music Journal 24(4): 12–18.Google Scholar
Chadabe, J. 2000. Remarks on Computer Music Culture. Computer Music Journal 24(4): 9–11.Google Scholar
Clement, A. 2011. Brutalism: Post-War British Architecture. Ramsbury, UK: Crowood Press.Google Scholar
Collis, A. 2008. Sounds of the System: The Emancipation of Noise in the Music of Carsten Nicolai. Organised Sound 13(1): 31–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Colpitt, Frances 1993. Minimal Art: The Critical Perspective. Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press.Google Scholar
Demers, J. 2010. Listening through the Noise: The Aesthetics of Experimental Electronic Music. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Gallanti, F. 2013. Sigurd Lewerentz. Enigmatic Brutalism. In Brutalism. CLOG.Google Scholar
Gann, K. 2004. Thankless Attempts at a Definition of Minimalism. In C. Cox and D. Warner (eds.) Audio Culture: Readings in Modern Music. New York: Continuum.Google Scholar
Glancey, J. 2014. Brutalism: How Unpopular Buildings Came Back in Fashion. BBC Culture, 28 August. www.bbc.com/culture/story/20140828-why-brutal-is-beautiful (accessed 13 March 2015).Google Scholar
Hegarty, P. 2007. Noise Music: A History. New York: Bloomsbury Academic.Google Scholar
Hegarty, P. 2008. Just What is it that Makes Today’s Noise Music so Different, so Appealing? Organised Sound 13(1): 13–20.Google Scholar
Hicks, S. and Newmeyer, A. 2013. Save the Prentice Wrecking Ball: The Monument to Bruce. In Brutalism. CLOG.Google Scholar
Hofer, S. 2014. ‘Atomic’ Music: Navigating Experimental Electronica and Sound Art through Microsound. Organised Sound 19(3): 295–303.Google Scholar
Kelly, C. 2009. Cracked Media: The Sound of Malfunction. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Knowles, J. D. 2006. Alva Noto. Filter 62: 17–19.Google Scholar
Landy, L. 2007. Understanding the Art of Sound Organization. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Lewis, M. J. 2014. The ‘New’ New Brutalism. New Criterion (December). www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/The--new--New-Brutalism-8018 (accessed 17 March 2015).Google Scholar
MacArthur, J. 2005. The Nomenclature of Style: Brutalism, Minimalism, Art History and Visual Style in Architecture Journals. Architectural Theory Review 10(2): 100–108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meades, J. (writer and presenter) 2014. Bunkers, Brutalism and Bloodymindedness: Concrete Poetry with Jonathan Meades. BBC Four.Google Scholar
Myatt, T. 2008. New Aesthetics and Practice in Experimental Electronic Music. Organised Sound 13(1): 1–3.Google Scholar
Neill, B. 2002. Pleasure Beats: Rhythm and the Aesthetics of Current Electronic Music. Leonardo Music Journal 12: 3–6.Google Scholar
New Aesthetics in Computer Music 2008. University of York Research Centre. www.york.ac.uk/music/mrc/projects/nacm (accessed 26 February 2015).Google Scholar
Reidel, J. 2013. Ugly. In Brutalism. CLOG.Google Scholar
Sampson, S. D. 2012. The Topophilia Hypothesis: Ecopsychology Meets Evolutionary Psychology. In P. H. Kahn Jr. and P. H. Hasbach (eds.) Ecopsychology: Science, Totems, and the Technological Species. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Sangild, T. 2004. Glitch – The Beauty of Malfunction. In C. Washburne and M. Derno (eds.) Bad Music: the Music We Love to Hate. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Shapiro, G. F. 2013. Brutalism and Landscape Desire. In Brutalism. CLOG.Google Scholar
Sherburne, P. 2002. 12k: Between Two Points. Organised Sound 6(3): 171–176.Google Scholar
Sherburne, P. 2004. Digital Discipline: Minimalism in House and Techno. In C. Cox and D. Warner (eds.) Audio Culture: Readings in Modern Music. New York: Continuum.Google Scholar
Smithson, A. and Smithson, P. 2011. The New Brutalism. October 136: 37 Reprinted from Architectural Design 27 (April 1957): 113.Google Scholar
Stark, B. 2013. Brutalism in the Mountains. In Brutalism. CLOG.Google Scholar
Sterken, S. 2007. Music as an Art of Space: Intersections between Music and Architecture in the Work of Iannis Xenakis. In M. Muecke and M. Zach (eds.) Resonance: Essays on the Intersection of Music and Architecture. Ames, IA: Culicidae Architectural Press.Google Scholar
Szepanski, A. 2001. A Mille Plateaux Manifesto. Organised Sound 6(3): 225–228.Google Scholar
Thomson, P. 2004. Atoms and Errors: Towards a History and Aesthetics of Microsound. Organised Sound 9(2): 207–218.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vidler, A. 2013. Brutalism: Aesthetic or Ethic?. In Brutalism. CLOG.Google Scholar
Villacorta, W. and Marsollier, C. 2013. Candidate. In Brutalism. CLOG.Google Scholar
Voegelin, S. 2010. Listening to Noise and Silence: Toward a Philosophy of Sound Art. New York: Bloomsbury Academic.Google Scholar
Zareei, M. H. 2015a. Physical Glitch Music: A Brutalist Noise Ensemble. Leonardo Music Journal 25: 63–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zareei, M. H. 2015b. Mo Zareei’s Kinetic Sound Sculptures. Streaming Museum Website. www.streamingmuseum.org/mh-zareei.Google Scholar
Zareei, M. H., Carnegie, D. A. and Kapur, A. 2014a. Rasper: A Mechatronic Noise-Intoner. Proceedings of the 2014 International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression. London, UK.Google Scholar
Zareei, M. H., Carnegie, D. A., McKinnon, D. and Kapur, A. 2014b. Mutor: Drone Chorus of Metrically Muted Motors. Proceedings of the 2014 International Computer Music Conference-Sound and Music Computing Conference. Athens, Greece.Google Scholar
Zareei, M. H., Carnegie, D. A., McKinnon, D. and Kapur, A. 2015. Rippler: A Mechatronic Sound-sculpture. Journal of Comparative Media Arts 1. http://cmajournal.ca/mo-h-zareei.Google Scholar
Zimoun. 2011. Interview with Ear Room. https://earroom.wordpress.com/2011/01/01/zimoun. (accessed 6 March 2015).Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Zareei supplementary material

Zareei supplementary material

Download Zareei supplementary material(File)
File 74.3 MB