Martin Messier: Field

Title:

Field

Artist(s) and People Involved:

Creation Year:

2015

Medium:

Sound and light performance

Artist Statement:

Exploring the performative qualities of an electrical field while conjuring and animating it, Martin Messier’s latest work lays bare invisible and inaudible power flows through constant plugging and replugging of cables set between a diptych of connection panels. This “field” becomes an instrument and Messier’s body becomes a conduit, a part of the field, as he conducts the electric currents and composes them into sound and asymmetrical rhythm. Light and darkness interplay as wires illuminate and projections of Messier’s movements provide ghostly apparitions of modulated magic. Created in collaboration with Thomas Payette (Robert Lepage/Ex Machina) and premiered at MUTEK 2015, Field produces multiple variations on sound, light and space as he captures, manipulates and visualizes for the audience, a collage of electromagnetic fields. With the help of a microphone that features lectromagnetic transducers, he harnesses residual electrical signals that are imperceptible to the human ear, and uses them as the driving soundtrack for his choreography of interventions.