Creating Living,
Musical Paintings
Sounds of a Sphere blends traditional musical performance with theatrical art, visualising the sound & soul of cultures worldwide.
An Indian (Tamil) classical performance performed by Archana Ravi. Unmute to listen.
INSPIRATION
Example of an artistic style applied to each video frame using the algorithm
Lisa Reihana's In Pursuit of Venus
Simplistic backdrops place focus on the stunning compositions and costumes from Zi De Guqin.
PROCESS
1. A choice of song (or songs) is offered by the musician.
2. The artist and musician agree on song(s); discuss their mood & meaning / set & setting and together come up with an art direction.
3. We agree on filming a dub or live performance. A draft of the art-piece is created. The musical performance is filmed against a green screen with relevant attire (optional) and a lighting setup to match the art-piece.
4. The performance is implemented into the artwork
5. (If recorded live) The music stems are mixed, and the resulting master is combined with the video.
6. The video is uploaded to YouTube, and in most cases, entered into film festivals & projected in gallery exhibitions.
STYLE / BRAND
Traditional/cultural music encapsulates such a diverse range that we attempt to narrow down our choices to keep some cohesion between musical paintings.
'Less is more' is our general ethos - emphasising dynamic melodies that embody a connection to culture and land. The song choices are capable of moving emotions and are in their essence, beautiful. Think: Melodies of the heart. These could be joyous, energetic, or slow and sad. What matters is that a strong feeling is encapsulated - coming from a cultural and/or personal place.
'Cultural' is anything that resonates the creative heart and soul of a culture.
Sounds of a Sphere places focus on the simple, the sincere and the timeless.
To captivate a listener’s emotions in totality, in some cases all it may take is a single player: playing one instrument and/or singing with raw imperfection.
Overall, here are some examples: Norway, Armenia, Peru, India, Armenia (2), Kenya
The artworks will initially be created by myself. In the near future, I wish to bring in other artists who have related cultural ties to the collaboration table. Any suggestions are welcome!
Artworks can be digital Eg) Photoshop, 3D, Realtime: Unreal, TouchDesigner or physical such as painting, drawing. Subtle animations are a great bonus.
They could be simple and elegant, focusing on colours or a lack thereof, leaving much to the imagination...
Or rich and complex, painting a vivid scene.... but the art should not steal the focus from the performers.
Cues from the cultures historical artistic styles are strongly encouraged. Research & feedback will take place to ensure symbolic accuracy, in the hopes of avoiding kitsch, tacky or culturally appropriated art. For this reason, like the music, less is usually more.
PAYMENT
I wish for musicians and artists to receive equal shares, conscious of equal input. If one party has put in more time than the other, profits will be balanced accordingly.
By default, any profits from video streaming or NFTs are divided by the musician (35%), the artist (35%) and brand (30% - covering costs and promotion).
It's important to me that this balance feels fair, thus this framework is negotiable.
WHO AM I / PROJECT ORIGINS
I am a New Zealand born digital illustrator and producer / mixing engineer based in Auckland. You can view my artwork here.
I am one third of the musical act Kahika: Examples of my love for atmospheric sound design, which can be subtly incorporated in this project, can be heard here and here.
Outside of NZ, Australia and the UK, I've also lived in Germany, Romania and France. My earnings over the last decade were all spent on travel. As the number of places I visited grew, so did my capacity to fully immerse myself; taking longer trips and deepening my curiousity in the people, the culture and their myriad forms of art/music.
This project was inspired by and born in Romania; a culture vibrantly rich in music both contemporary and traditional. It is an ode to the Romanians, who keep music for pure expressions sake very much alive in their hearts.
If you have read this far, I thank you for taking the time to consider this proposal and I hope we can collaborate.
Jonathan Hislop.
