Vibrant Matter II

Sound installation / room-sized musical instrument

Vibrant Matter II is a room-sized musical instrument and a textile installation developed during a month-long residency at The Watermill Center. It was created in the main studio there as a dialogue with the room’s architectural elements.

The materials researched for this installation were also inspired by the location, making use of fabrics that would generally be used for potato storing or for protecting plant-life from the Long Island winter. We were interested in exploring ways in which a textile structure could invite interaction from the viewer. Throughout our process, we asked ourselves the following questions:

- how does the idea of the space that the textile will inhabit influence its creation?

- how can this interface expand the dimension of a musical gesture on a new scale?

- how can multiple performers share a single instrument?

- what kind of non-traditional action can be adopted to make sound (beyond the more common blowing, hitting, scraping, picking etc)?