Kosmogonía. Film performance para un planetario

Kosmogonía. Film performance para un planetario is the work of visual artist Deneb Martos and sound improviser Wade Matthews, who have already worked together on pieces like Gold Film and Skin Film (the latter in collaboration with dancer Cecilia Gala). The work process sets out from the direct use of materials of all kinds, somewhat unusual and chosen for their shapes, for their organic properties or for their symbolic meaning, on the orthochromatic film, which reacts in a partly uncontrolled way. Starting out from this slightly random premise opens up a genuinely experimental path, which at this point calls for enormous technical precision and maximum attention from the artists. The conditions of the screening and the live improvisation are as fundamental to the work as the way it is prepared. At its base is a rigorous theoretical foundation, which commits fully to execution in time to become invisible and allow the viewer to sink into a state bordering on a trance. In this way cameraless film-making and sound improvisation are used to revive atavistic memories.

The film, to be projected onto the dome of the planetarium (Tornamira room), takes as its starting point the cosmos. The elements chosen for the film print and the acoustic part might be considered waste, very modest compared to the wonders of the galaxy, but these organic remains and fragments of sound, collected and processed by Deneb Martos and Wade Matthews, end up revealing how the whole can be sensed in a minuscule part, and illuminating -like an ephemeral torch- the constant course of contraction and expansion.

In this case, the piece is supported with texts by Bárbara Mingo Costales, author of the essay Vilnis, devoted to Lithuanian composer and painter Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis, a synesthetic artist in whose work the cosmos plays a primordial part.

We feel the desire to come closer to what is distant, and what seems the most distant is in fact our home. We think of a gap and without realising we are describing a dome. What we grasp as distance is shown to be surface. We are knocking at the door from the very centre of the galaxy. Here goes with an attempt to rope in everything that gravitates and revolves, using an incantation that goes, "Shine, shine, shine and tinkle". And the galaxy answers and everything shines and tinkles.

Length: 30 minutes
35 mm projection
Digital synthesis and manipulation of field recordings in real time

Deneb Martos. Visual artist specialising in cameraless film and photochemical techniques. In her work she uses analogue projection devices, exposing the physical phenomenon of the image and turning it into the record of an emanation of lights and shadows whose direct dialogue with the materials printed on the celluloid highlight their haptic qualities denoting atavistic prints and traces.

Wade Matthews. Sound artist. Digital synthesis, amplified objects and processed field recordings.