Andreas Bülhoff and Marc Matter – ɅV / A Sonic Writing Tool

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12″ Vinyl – Research and Waves

The Berlin label Research and Waves, an artistic project curated by Jasmina Al-Qaisi, Maria Karpushina, Gustavo Méndez Lopez, Norman Neumann and Henrik Nieratschker, released a twelve inch vinyl composed of words, a sort of manual for DJs, which can be used to create an artificial dialogue. ɅV (the phonetic transliteration for on/off) is for Andreas Bülhoff and Marc Matter, the creators of this very special work, a post-digital version of sound-poetry, with thirty-two monosyllabic words on each side. The words were collected during the winter 2018/19 from the website of the New York Times and from a subforum named Politically Incorrect. Two synthetic voices declaim the words and the platforms taken under consideration reflect the extreme opposites of the current online debate, on the edge between mainstream liberalism and reactionary subculture, formal and informal language, journalistic approach and chitchat. ɅV is also considered by the authors and the editorial collective as a starting point for Attune, the online platform of Research and Waves that explores and feeds sound processes and gestures, focusing on practices of remixing, sampling, cutting, mashing, quoting, covering, morphing and fading. This also activates an intercultural debate on several forms of oppression, from racism and white supremacy, through to patriarchy and neoliberalism. Can words be neutral? Clearly not, but a lot depends on what neutral is meant to be. Language is not something static; it is in continuous evolution and the language contexts the speakers and the writers employ are not neutral either. Language can also never be considered neutral from a political point of view, because the narration of what the reality seems to be is always changing and changes according to our perceptions and daily actions. What needs to be done at this point is to join the dots between words and their sources, the fragments of uneasy speech about the state of society, subject to viral assaults at the inner core of language.

 

Andreas Bülhoff and Marc Matter – ɅV / A Sonic Writing Tool