Alaric Sumner
Nekyia
Nekyia Text by Sumner
Media / Multimedia performance
Duration:
32'00
Date: 1999
Commissioned by:
Shawford Mill Theatre
Videoclip
1 (for slow connection)
File Size: 1.7Mb Duration: 1'48
Videoclip
1 (for fast connections: ISDN+)
File Size: 4.9Mb Duration: 1'48
Videoclip
2 (for slow connection)
File Size: 1.3Mb Duration: 1'41
Videoclip
2 (for fast connections: ISDN+)
File Size: 3.7Mb Duration: 1'41
Videoclip
3
(for slow connection)
File Size: 1.3Mb Duration: 1'34
Videoclip
3
(for fast connections: ISDN+)
File Size: 3.7Mb Duration: 1'34
Related Links
Interactive audiovisual
work at
'Riding the Meridian'
64 Refractions: Nekyia
http://www.heelstone.com/meridian/
hyde.html
More of Alaric Sumner's work
http://www.crosswinds.net/
~subvoicivepoetry/sumner/sumndex1.html
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The 'nekyia' is a night sea journey, a descent into the underworld or into the belly of a sea monster, and a meeting with the dead. It is a myth which occurs in many cultures in different forms and symbolises the struggle towards spiritual or psychological revelation and transformation.
Nekyia
is a work for speaker, singer, electroacoustic music and video. It could
be read as a study of the 'nekyia' myth itself or a descent into psychological
depths (the dreamworld). Formally, it might be considered an exploration
of the sonic elements of text (the relationship between sound and language
and the sound in language). However, it is also a piece which aims to
resist unification, keeping all its different themes in dynamic motion.
Research and
development of Nekyia was funded by the Arts Council of England. It
was commissioned for Shawford Mill Theatre in Somerset, a disused Watermill
converted into a theatre, mainly for opera. The sound of the swollen
river rushing underneath the building and the rhythm of the water wheel
worked their way into the sonic landscape of this piece, emphasising
the textual, visual and sonic references to water in the work.
Hyde and Sumner
have used many sources (often distorted beyond recognition) to construct
a work of fragments, which builds a surprisingly operatic, though formally
sparse, event. Two performers, starkly lit, read or sing from either
side of a video projection -a recital for eyes and ears. The works of
Homer, Virgil, Debussy, Foucault, Jung, Haroldo de Campos and many others
are plundered, distorted, transformed into a multilayered and intricate
mix of sound, language and image.
There is a
close relationship between the text and the sonic material. Most of
the electroacoustic music was constructed from Sumner's texts, spoken
and sung, and the compositional techniques of mismatch, quotation, distortion
and dislocation in the different media, interweave to create a disturbingly
fragmentary coherence. Nekyia went through many transformations and
traces of earlier tributaries were retained and are evident in the finished
piece. Joseph Hyde had overall responsibility for sound and video and
Alaric Sumner for text, but the compositional process was collaborative
with each artist active in all aspects of the piece.
Additional
Information
Nekyia (35
mins) and Nekyia Study (10 mins -originally a pilot for the final
project) have been performed at Baggott Inn, New York; Champlibre, Montreal;
Shawford Mill, Somerset; Metrum, Rhythmus, Performanz Conference, University
of Vechta, Germany; Sonic Arts Network Conference, University of Huddersfield,
Yorkshire; Dartington Arts Centre, Devon; Ultima, Oslo, Norway; Schouwberg,
Rotterdam; University of East Anglia, Norwich. Texts from the development
of the piece were published in Masthead Literary Arts Magazine (Melbourne,
Australia 1999). Out of the collaboration, Hyde also created 64 Refractions
(Nekyia) for On Line, a CDRom Supplement for Performance Research
PR4:2 (curators Ric Allsopp and Scott deLahunta). He also made a
version for the sound/text section (edited by Sumner) of the second
issue of Riding the Meridian (http://www.heelstone.com/meridian).
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