This performance is a collaboration between the UCLA Art Sci center and Harvestworks NY — bringing to the forefront the NY > LA relationship and the shared position of being the hot spots on either side of the country. The networked compositions of audio and visuals are shared with sound/media artists around the world who invited to contribute their concept.
Date: Tuesday June 16, 2020
Time: 5 pm
Location: YouTube Live
Inherent Uncertainty is led by sound artist Clinton Van Arnam, currently a student in the Design Media Arts program and part of the UCLA Art Sci collective.
This project was conceptualized with the intent of composing and amplifying the live data analysis of Johns Hopkins Covid-19 worldwide data including recovered, deaths, and total cases. Data is sent through custom software into analog and digital synthesizers which trigger visuals formed by news clips recorded on June 1st, 2020 during the protests that followed the death of George Floyd.
The title Inherent Uncertainty represents our current state of affairs and the systems we are seeing crumble before our own eyes. As the viewer listens to the sound shift and change, these shifts are simply the analysis and the parallelity of the destruction of the virus. This project explores the unpredictability of our future and the thin veneer that we define as a ‘civil’ society.
Software engineering by John Brumley. Music by Paul Geluso and Clinton Van Arnam. Visuals by Ivana Dama in collaboration with Clinton Van Arnam. Creative collaboration with Harvestworks, New York including Carol Parkinson, and Paul Geluso. Mentorship and creative vision in partnership with Victoria Vesna, UCLA.
This project uses live data analysis of Johns Hopkins Covid-19 worldwide data including recovered, deaths, and total cases to signal and create a generative sound piece. Data will be sent through custom software engineered by John Brumley. Through this software, artists in New York and Los Angeles are able to create abstractions in the numeric values related to each specific open-source data table in real-time. This software will translate the data into analog and digital synthesizers which will act as an input to the visuals formed by news clips recorded in Los Angeles on June 1st, 2020 during the protests that followed the death of George Floyd.
Through this abstraction, artists are able to create and explore their own personal evaluation of the pandemic, but also of the current shift, we are experiencing in the world. As the viewer is consumed by the sound shift and change, these shifts are simply the analysis and the parallelity of the destruction of the virus.
This project is crucial now because it is the artist’s responsibility as a culture worker to create and express the feelings that are currently surrounding the world. Inherent Uncertainty explores the unpredictability of our future and the thin veneer that we define as a ‘civil’ society.