Participation of Mexican artists in the visual sonic arts festival "Sonica" 2017

     “Sonica” is a year-round programme of events dedicated to world-class visual sonic arts, curated and produced by Cryptic.The festival presents emerging British talent alongside exceptional international artists in collaboration with renowned co-producers and venues.

     This unique project was launched in Glasgow in November 2012 and has travelled to Australia, Austria, Brazil, Denmark, France, Indonesia, Mexico, Netherlands, Slovenia, South Korea, Sweden and across the UK.

     The festival will be held from October 25th to November 5th, 2017, with a particular focus on Mexican sounds, featuring the renowned Mexican artists Manuel Rocha Iturbide, Marcela Armas and Gilberto Esparza.

 

-Manuel Rocha Iturbide-

Two installations: The Extended Tension and  Z z z z z z z z z

 

1. "The Extended Tension"

     Installation based on the tension of an electric guitar. The tension in this installation is extended in space through the element that originates sound, the strings, whose longitude is not limited by the guitar´s arm. The guitar is found in suspension, tensed, inert and in silence, but appears to be floating and comfortable. The guitar vibrates completely and stops being the primary body in order to be converted into the heart of a new expanded object.

 

2. "Z z z z z z z z z"

     A portable record player lies in a chair as if abandoned. Though it is inert, sometimes spontaneously, the record begins to spin, making a noise that sounds suspiciously ... snoring?  The installation go from an open noise to a hidden noise, and even entering a field of ambiguity when it transforms into something indistinguishable.

     Manuel Rocha Iturbide is a composer and sound artist, he works in a multidisciplinary field, generating sculptures and sound installations linked to the urban in order to make the receiver aware of their surroundings. He has published articles of art and technology, sound art and computer music in various national and international publications; his music has been performed in Mexico, USA, Canada, Latin America, Europe and Asia. He has participated in several festivals like: Mutek, Mexico City, Puddles. Festival of intermediate art and experimental electronic music, Tokyo (Japan), and the ICMC, International Festival of computer music, Götebur (Sweden) among many others.

 

-Gilberto Esparza and Marcela Armas

 

-Sideral-

     Sound installation in collaboration with the Glasgow Science Center, Natural History Museum, Anglo Arts, The Anglo Mexican Foundation, the British Council Mexico, CMMAS (Mexican Center for Music and Sound Arts) and Cryptic.

     Sideral comprises a series of sound articulations that come from reading and interpreting local magnetic fields at sites where meteorites have fallen to the Earth. Armas and Esparza challenge the perception of space as silent. As iron meteorites make their journey through space, the extreme events they pass through are recorded as changes in their magnetic field, a kind of records through which scientists can understand where the meteorite come from.

     Armas and Esparza go one step further: In this fascinating installation, a 82kg meteorite called Boxhole (a loan courtesy the Museum of Natural History of London) found in Australia in 1937, is cradled in wooden sensor-limbs that 'read' the meteorite and generate an eerie, modulating music that’s also a kind of storytelling, the account of an almost unimaginable journey through the void.

 

Marcela Armas :

     Her work seeks to articulate disciplines, techniques, work processes and research to address concerns about the relationships of society with matter, energy, space, time and the construction of history.

     BFA by the University of Guanajuato and MFA by the Politecnic University in Valencia, Spain. She has been supported by the National Foundation for the Arts in Mexico, New Media Research Center in Mexico City, Arte-Actual Bancomer-MACG 2009; and participated in Mercosur Biennial in Porto Alegre, Brazil, 2009 and Habana 11th Biennial “Social practices and imaginaries”, 2012.

     She was selected for VIDA 16.0, the production granted by Fundación Telefónica in Spain. Recently she directed Implant, a public space art project based in Denver and Mexico City, developed for the Biennial of the Americas. Since 2016, she is member of the National Art System, FONCA in Mexico.

     Her work has been exhibited in Mexico, North and South America, Europe, India and Moscu.

 

Gilberto Esparza :

     Mexican artist who has developed the majority of his artistic production around the  interactive art. His work has received different prizes, like the Prize ARTFest 05, World Trade Center, Mexico DF. (2005), Incentive to new productions. VIDA 09. Fundación Telefónica de España (2009),  and the Scholarship of the State Fund for Culture and the Arts of Guanajuato (2002). 2, among others.

     He completed his studies in Plastic Arts at the University of Guanajuato and at the Facultad de Bellas Artes de San Carlos, U.P.V. in Valencia, Spain. Gilberto investigate technology as a possibility to raise questions and solutions to the impacts of the human footprint on earth. His practice explore consumer technology recycling and experiments with biotechnology.

     Different research centres have collaborated on Esparza’s projects: The Chemical and Process Engineering Group of the University of Cartagena, Spain, CINVESTAV, and The Mechatronics Area ofthe National Polytechnic Institute, Engineering Institute Juriquilla, UNAM, Digital Arts and the University of Guanajuato.

     He has participated in individual and collective exhibitions in Mexico, the United States, Canada, Brazil, Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, Argentina, Spain, Holland, Belgium, Slovenia, Dhoa. He received the Golden Nika, Hybrid Art in Prix Ars Electronica 2015, second prize Life 13 of Fundación Telefónica de España, honourable mention in the Ars Electrónica, Linz Austria and the Ibero-American Production Award VIDA 09. He is currently a member of the National Creator System of art.

 

More details can be found at the following link:

http://sonic-a.co.uk/installations/

 

Details