Concert for Maison Seirēn
Klenz, Steffi (2014) Concert for Maison Seirēn. [Installation, Photography]
Installation view from group exhibition Ship to Shore, SeaCity Museum, 2014
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Installation view from group exhibition Ship to Shore, SeaCity Museum, 2014
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Installation view from group exhibition Ship to Shore, SeaCity Museum, 2014
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Installation view from group exhibition Ship to Shore, SeaCity Museum, 2014
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Installation view from group exhibition Ship to Shore, SeaCity Museum, 2014
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Installation view from group exhibition Ship to Shore, SeaCity Museum, 2014
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Installation view from group exhibition Ship to Shore, SeaCity Museum, 2014
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Concert for Maison Seirēn at group exhibition Powerful Tides: 400 Years of Chatham and the Sea
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Concert for Maison Seirēn at group exhibition Powerful Tides: 400 Years of Chatham and the Sea
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Concert for Maison Seirēn at group exhibition Powerful Tides: 400 Years of Chatham and the Sea
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Concert for Maison Seirēn at group exhibition Powerful Tides: 400 Years of Chatham and the Sea
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Concert for Maison Seirēn at group exhibition Powerful Tides: 400 Years of Chatham and the Sea
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Concert for Maison Seirēn at group exhibition Powerful Tides: 400 Years of Chatham and the Sea
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Ship to Shore: Art and The Lure of the Sea by Jean Wainwright, published by John Hansard Gallery and SeaCity Museum Southampton, UK, 2018, page 70-77 (Interview Steffi Klenz)
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Ship to Shore: Art and The Lure of the Sea by Jean Wainwright, published by John Hansard Gallery and SeaCity Museum Southampton, UK, 2018, page 70-77 (Interview Steffi Klenz)
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Ship to Shore: Art and The Lure of the Sea by Jean Wainwright, published by John Hansard Gallery and SeaCity Museum Southampton, UK, 2018, page 70-77 (Interview Steffi Klenz)
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Ship to Shore: Art and The Lure of the Sea by Jean Wainwright, published by John Hansard Gallery and SeaCity Museum Southampton, UK, 2018, page 70-77 (Interview Steffi Klenz)
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Ship to Shore: Art and The Lure of the Sea by Jean Wainwright, published by John Hansard Gallery and SeaCity Museum Southampton, UK, 2018, page 70-77 (Interview Steffi Klenz)
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Ship to Shore: Art and The Lure of the Sea by Jean Wainwright, published by John Hansard Gallery and SeaCity Museum Southampton, UK, 2018, page 70-77 (Interview Steffi Klenz)
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Ship to Shore: Art and The Lure of the Sea by Jean Wainwright, published by John Hansard Gallery and SeaCity Museum Southampton, UK, 2018, page 70-77 (Interview Steffi Klenz)
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12 individual diamond shaped images, Metallic Colour C-Type Prints framed in brushed steel-tray frames,
accompanied by music (10.01minutes on loop).
The lighthouse has captured our imagination throughout history as comforting yet mysterious, aiming at safety yet also symbolizing adventure and despair. The piece is particularly interested in the rhythmic and repeating pulse of the light signal and the ways it could be thought of as a visual translation of the siren, an ambiguous figure of the sea, simultaneously evoking danger, trepidation and seduction.
Concert for Maison Seirēn focuses on the repetitive movement of the lighthouse lamp (light) as a visual voice: the musical seduction of the siren's luring voice is here validated through the use of enchanting light. The piece is a wall installation of 12 diamond-shaped individual photographs, edited and arranged according to compositional principles of serialism as outlined by the composer Arnold Schoenberg (1874–1951).
The Austrian composer, leading the Second Viennese School, was interested in creating serial music creating the twelve-tone technique in 1923, consciously using an ordered series of all twelve notes in the chromatic scale for a structural purpose.
This structural organizing principle is a means of ensuring that all twelve notes are sounded as often as one another in a piece of music while preventing the emphasis of any one note: all 12 notes are thus given equal importance. As such, twelve-tone music is atonal, and according to Schoenberg describes serialism as a means of organizing and structuring more coherently modes of repetition in that the music is not based on harmonic-contrapuntal constraints as in tonal music, lacking a tonal centre or key.
Concert for Maison Seirēn is based on both the development of musical as well as photographic language. It offers a play between visual and oral structural modes. It becomes a carefully composed display of visual voices: sequenced photographs ascending and descending on the wall like notes on a musical sheet.
The images are accompanied by a piece of music, composed by Neil Codling. Neil has been songwriter and keyboard player for the alternative rock group Suede since 1995 and has extensive knowledge of Schoenberg's theories. Neil has translated the visual piece of 12 diamond-shaped into a musical piece for the piano and violin applying Arnold Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique.
The piece was shown as part of the international group exhibition, Ship to Shore: The Art and Lure of the Sea, SeaCity Museum, February-May 2014. The exhibition has been reviewed by Art Monthly No 375, April 2014.
The 'Ship to Shore' exhibition has been reviewed by Art Monthly, No 375, April 2014.
Accompanying book, 'Ship to Shore: Art and the Lure of the Sea', with written contributions by Philip Hoare and Dr Jean Wainwright, published by John Hansard Gallery and Cornerhouse Publications, spring 2018 (art work discussed in interview between Dr.Jean Wainwright and Steffi Klenz).
The images are accompanied by a piece of music, composed by Neil Codling. Neil has been songwriter and keyboard player for the alternative rock group Suede since 1995 and has extensive knowledge of Arnold Schoenberg’s theories. Neil has translated the visual piece of 12 diamond-shaped into a musical piece for the piano and violin applying Arnold Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique.
Concert for Maison Seirēn was also shown as part of the international group-exhibition 'Powerful Tides: 400 year of Chatham and the Sea' at Historic Dockyard Museum, Chatham, 2018, including work by the following artists:
historic works: John Constable, J.M.W Turner, William Wyllie, Norman Wilkinson and Eric Ravilious
contemporary works:
Anselm Kiefer, Yinka Shonibare MBE (RA), Tracey Emin, Richard Wilson, Langlands & Bell, Christiane Baumgartner, Nadav Kander, Nikolaj Larsen, Layla Curtis and Chris Orr.
The exhibition is not only a celebration of the artists inspired by The Dockyard and the ships that were built there, but also links The Dockyard back to the waterways and the sea to which it was once intrinsically connected. The exhibition reflects how Chatham impacted on key artists between the 18th and 20th centuries – names such as John Constable, J.M.W Turner, William Wyllie, Norman Wilkinson and Eric Ravilious – inspired by the engineering wonders created at the Royal Dockyard at Chatham. The exhibition provides a link to the present – how the River Medway, Thames Estuary and the North Sea – all important route ways to the dockyard in its past, still inspire artists today.
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8884-0519
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