Speaker 1 00:00:04 This chapter introduces the audio description tour. It is a minute long. Hello. Welcome to the audio description tour for drift art in dark matter. My name is Fiona Wright and I'm the educator at Carlton university art gallery. The audio description tour will provide you with an overall description of the exhibition as well as its specific artworks and installations. The audio description tour will lead you on a path to two different art installations identified by tactile floor markings. Through the exhibition space, there will be three to four stops within each art installation. Each stop includes a description of a specific part of the art installation and then more information and prompts for connecting with it. The audio description tour is organized as a series of chapters. The total length of the tour is just over an hour. You can skip or repeat the chapters of this tour at any time. At the end of each chapter, you will be notified when you can move to the next stop.
Speaker 1 00:01:21 Chapter one about the exhibition. This chapter introduces the exhibition and as one minute and 35 seconds long, welcome to drift art and dark matter. An exhibition of four contemporary artists who connect physics to art, labor landscapes, cultures, and histories. It is curated by sunny cur and was organized by Agnes Etherington art center at Queens university, the Arthur B. MacDonald Canadian Astro particle physics research Institute and snow lab. We'll begin with a brief background about the exhibition. What dark matter is, and the site of snow lab in 2019 for artists, Nadia, lik TIG, Josepha and jam and Riley and Joel, Tom's traveled to Sudbury in Northern Ontario to visit snow lab. A research facility built in a nickel mine, two kilometers underground. They were invited to explore the intersections of art and science through an interdisciplinary search for dark matter. Dark matter makes up 84% of matter in the universe because it does not absorb reflect or emit light.
Speaker 1 00:02:35 It can not be seen or detected by scientists directly. It reveals itself through its gravitational effects by keeping planets in their orbits and stars within their galaxies. After spending time in snow lab, the artist created sculptures videos, photographs, and textiles, which are present in this exhibition. These artworks at the agents that link scientific ideas of dark matter and the exploration of that, which has never been directly synced chapter two description of the art gallery. This chapter provides you with a physical description of the art gallery. And as one minute and 45 seconds long, you are on the first floor of the Carleton university art gallery. There was a large reception desk in front of you. You will find a tactile map of the gallery and the exhibition tour stops on the reception desk. The art gallery is a large open room shaped like an L on its side with a small arm pointed up.
Speaker 1 00:03:38 You are currently just to the left of the angle of the L on the floor plan. The outside walls of the gallery are identified by a thick line. The floors are a lovely light and warm hardwood, and some walls are painted white while others are purple to your right is a small arm of the L. It is a room that is around 15 meters long by 17 meters wide and has double height ceilings and a balcony above where visitors can look down from the second floor. This room displays works by Nadia elliptic, including a very large floor installation. The tour stops for this space are identified by the raised circles on the map to your left is the long arm of the L, which is a longer room. That is 23 meters long by nine and a half meters wide. The ceilings are lower here and there are two small partition walls that divide the space.
Speaker 1 00:04:34 The first partition wall has a video work by Ann Riley with comfortable seating. You may hear her recorded voice just behind you. On the left. The longer room features a video and sculpture by Josepha and jam and a multicomponent installation by Joel Toms. The tourist stops for this space are identified with raised squares on the map at the far end of the room past the second partition wall, there are small photographs and paintings by Nadia electric. There are two sets of stairs in the gallery, one behind you. And one to your far left, both of which lead to the second floor between the stairs. There are three square floor to ceiling columns, chapter three, wayfinding in the art gallery. This chapter provides you with the description of the wayfinding tools that are part of the audio description tour. It is one minute and three seconds long to enhance your gallery experience.
Speaker 1 00:05:33 Tactile floor markings will help lead you on a one-way path to each of the stops associated with the audio description tour. The first stop for each artist's work will be identified with the rectangular wood pedestal. There are subsequent specific stops in each installation that correspond to chapters in this audio description tour and are identified by tactile dots, grouped on the floor. At any point, you can pause a chapter, replay it or skip forward videos and sound works are part of the exhibition as well. And we will describe them periodically throughout this tour, large print labels are hung on the wall and are removable allowing for closer examination of the text. Please move to the first stop on the tour. It is the introduction to an installation called inland the holographic principle by Joel Tom's. This stop is marked with a square rectangular pedestal, about six meters to your left. You may use the wall in front of you to help guide you pause this chapter and then play chapter four. When you arrive chapter four, introduction to inland the holographic principle by Joel Tom's. This chapter will provide you with an introduction to Joel Tom's installation and land. The holographic principle. The chapter is two minutes and 33 seconds long curator, Sonny curves commentary about the artwork can be found in chapter 11 or as a printed label on the wall,
Speaker 2 00:07:05 Because there are so many components to this installation and land. The holographic principle can almost be described as a mini exhibition within the main exhibition. It takes up a third of the main gallery space in the middle of the long arm of the L in a space that is about 20 feet long by 31 feet wide. Most of the space has a ceiling that is eight feet tall, but it opens up to ceilings that are 19 feet tall. These art objects were created using imagery and materials from Joel's residency at snow lab. In this audio description tour, we examine four parts of the hole. The first is his video work and land, which plays on a large flat screen TV on the gallery wall. The second and third are a Subbury bedrock compilation map from Canada's geological survey and a copy of the Huron Robertson treaty, which are both framed and hung on the gallery wall.
Speaker 2 00:08:00 The fourth is an angle sculpture made of slotted steel, which hangs from the 19 foot ceiling three feet from the ground. The sculpture is approximately four feet by four feet by four feet and weighs 183 pounds. That's big. There are also many small sculptures made of rock and brass set on the wood floor. Photographs of 3d rendered laboratory spaces and a white desk with a computer monitor and binders of documents. The computer screen plays video with images and data from the snow plus experiment on neutrino detector at snow lab, the artist was inspired by a strategy from theoretical physics, a way of thinking called holographic and uses it to play with multiple dimensions. As he says, I am interested in environmental studies and in physics and in the histories and philosophies of the unknown in his multifaceted work in the exhibition, he has found multiple ways to represent how we understand and examine a place. He wants us to remember that snow lab and the experiments done by the scientists within it exists within a larger context of vast cosmic, geological and human timescales.
Speaker 1 00:09:21 Now let's explore a few of the components and land the holographic principle. Please pause the recording and move to the next stop on the tour and play chapter five. When you arrive, this stop is straight ahead. 10 meters from the pedestal chapter five and land by Joel Toms. This chapter describes the end land video artwork by Joel Toms. Please note that the description is not in sync with the video. The chapter is four minutes and 19 seconds long.
Speaker 2 00:09:54 You are now in front of a large flat screen TV mounted on the gallery's wall. This chapter will describe specific parts of the video. It is approximately 17 minutes long and runs in a continual loop. It includes the following intersecting components, video footage that Tom's shot at snow lab, sweeping views of the surrounding wilderness of Northern Ontario marshes and forests, 3d rendered images of the laboratory spaces, text graphics, and voices of physicists. These components weave together, historical geographical, indigenous, and scientific contexts for the physical site of the sub remind in which snow lab operates though, you might hear a scientist voice at some points. There are lengthy parts of this film with no audio, pause this track to listen. Most gallery visitors don't take in the video in its entirety. They might arrive in the middle and leave when they want this Frank mentoree experience echoes the technique Joel has used in creating the visual and verbal assemblage of the video.
Speaker 2 00:11:08 The video begins with a gray and white checked pattern on the screen. This pattern is commonly used as the blank slate in the graphic design software Photoshop on top of which layers of images, graphics, and text are imposed. This checked pattern reappears throughout the video. The first sound we hear is a woman's voice. One of the scientists that Joel interview during his residency, she speaks about the need to change our worldview in order to understand the nature of subatomic particles, a shadow of the spinning steel sculpture appears text stylized as a three-dimensional font appears over top
Speaker 1 00:11:49 And land unvisible energies and forces bend defract interfere.
Speaker 2 00:11:58 The video then continues as a portrait rendered in fragments. These fragments include a geological map of the region that visualizes the geological impact of the media that created the Sudbury basin. 1.85 billion years ago, a black and white photo of the opening in the rock represents the Creighton mine that has operated here since 1901 images of the nor right rock, a dense Crystalyn igneous granite that surrounds the snow lab are shown. It also includes Joel's footage of moving through the dark tunnels and brightly lit labs at snow lab where scientists work in lab coats and hardhats, as well as beautiful views of the marshland and force in the fall season with blue skies and fiery leaves. This footage is juxtaposed with texts that describes the ongoing fight by the 21 first nations in Northern Ontario, including one, a potato first nation and Mrs. Saga first nation to receive annuities from the mine promised to them in 1850 together, these video components tell a story of this place. Halfway through the video. This text appears over the images,
Speaker 1 00:13:15 The landscape laboratory attempts to have intelligence with radical otherness matters beyond vision unphysical yet ubiquitous legible in the rotations of the galaxies to find relevant ways to think with such entities, researchers devise all manner of assemblages to burst the bubble of unknowing.
Speaker 2 00:13:40 The video is sometimes opaque, sometimes fragmented and sometimes poetic. It combines and recombines, knowledges, and worldviews in an attempt by Joel to sense the unknown,
Speaker 1 00:13:54 Stay at this dock and go to the next track to hear interpretations of the video and some prompts for further reflection or move to the next stop, which is three and a half meters behind you and play chapter seven, chapter six and land interpretation and prompts. This chapter provides you with opportunities to think about this video. More. This chapter is three minutes long.
Speaker 2 00:14:21 Imagine what happens to your senses. Two kilometers below the earth. You are surrounded by rock and minerals and embedded in the ongoing histories of peoples ecologies and technologies. You are far from everything familiar, the physicist of snow lab choose this site because the nor right rock shields, their experiments from the omnipresent cosmic radiation of the surface of the earth and the greater universe, the location is meant to hide smother and damp in this radiation. And yet, as a result, they hope it will also allow them to detect the undetectable by blocking one thing. Another is potentially amplified. This video brings us into the snow lab spaces. In one silencing, we move along a tunnel called a drift that bridges the laboratories. It is a long narrow path lit by tubes of light on the ceiling. In another scene, the camera spins and moves up the walls of Avast cavern like space that holds a multi-story machine.
Speaker 2 00:15:34 More rooms have been captured in 3d images, and then fragmented and overlayed on top of the video footage of the spinning space. The scientists narrates this leads to the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. That what we experienced is just one branch, one world in a whole multi-verse the world. As we know, it has three dimensions of space, length, width, and depth. Plus one dimension of time using text graphics in the video, the artist tells us that some of the equations physicists work with require 10 and the 11 dimensions to work. Is this new information or unexpected to you? How would it feel to be living in one possible dimension among many, and yet as the artist proposes the contracting and expanding of dimensions, the giving space to allows for otherwise unthinkable connections, it is in this place, deep underground that scientists grapple with the fact that they are working with a very limited toolkit and that they need more diverse perspectives. If humans are going to be able to make sense of the universe, to know the unknowable, one of the questions posed by this exhibition is how can art be a part of that
Speaker 1 00:17:02 Pause to reflect on these questions and then move to the next stop and play chapter seven. The next stop on the tour is three and a half meters away behind you. Chapter seven, map and treaty. This chapter describes a map of the Sudbury bedrock compilation from Canada's geological survey, which is located on the wall beside the flat screen TV, as well as a copy of the Robinson Huron treaty, which you are currently in front of. If you reach out, you can touch this wall and feel the frame that holds the treaty. This chapter it's five minutes and four seconds long.
Speaker 2 00:17:41 You are now in front of two large frame documents on the gallery wall. There is a multicolored map or the sub Murray bedrock compilation from Canada's geological survey, measuring 38 inches by 46 inches. There was also a copy of the Robinson Huron treaty signed in 1850 from library and archives, Canada measuring 11 inches by 16 and a half inches. Here is a more detailed description. The map shows a section of land north, east of Sunbury with the smaller windy lake in the bottom left and the larger one, a potato lake in the top, right on the map, many rivers and waterways cover the land like interconnecting veins marked in blue in the center of the map is an oblong light orange shape with multicolored rings, emanating from it. They are mustard, yellow, pink purple, red, and green. This map shows the summary impact structure or Sudbury basin.
Speaker 2 00:18:49 It is the third largest impact crater on earth and was formed 1.85 billion years ago today the creator measures 62 kilometers long by 30 kilometers wide and is 15 kilometers deep at the center is limestone shale and volcanic glomerate different types of rock like Knorr, right? And granite makeup. Other rings around the crater mining companies were drawn to the emergence of copper and nickel deposits within the rock crater. They began building mines in the late 19th century by 1915 sub reminds. We're providing an incredible 80% of the world's production of nickel. While this map provides information on the rich resources of this land. The artist also wants us to know that the Sudbury basin is situated on the traditional territory of the Anishinabek. This is why he includes a copy of the Robinson Huron treaty in his art installation.
Speaker 2 00:19:52 The framed copy of the treaty on display shows, both of its pages. One page is covered with tiny black scripted handwriting packed so densely that there are no margins. The other page has a few lines of script and is presented horizontally. The treaty is yellowed and shows where at the creases, where it has been folded below are the registration tools used when photographing and archival document the treaty documents states that it is an agreement made in the year 1850 at Sioux St. Marie in the province of Canada, between William Benjamin Robinson. On behalf of her majesty, the queen and the leaders of the following first nations. I took a mech Shang Anishinabek batch Awana, first nations of a jib ways. Dokies first nation, a jib ways of river Henry inlet, first nation Magna to one first nation Mississauga number eight first nation Nipissing first nation serpent river.
Speaker 2 00:21:03 First nation Sega MOC. First nation shall want to go first nation first nation that's Alon first nation want to first nation while succeeding first nation Whitefish river. First nation on deck Omni gunning first nation first nation. Should I go, Wanda, first nation zebra crossing, first nation Rick Wemy Kong unseated Indian reserve, number 26. These are the communities as the treaty states quote, inhabiting and claiming the Eastern and Northern shores of lake Huron from Penetanguishene to Sioux St. Marie and that's tobacco one on bay on the Northern shore of lake superior and quote, the first nations leaders granted the crown mining logging and selling rights on the north and east shores of lake Huron, excluding land that had already been set out for reservations. There are details about annual payments, including an augmentation clause, our sincere apologies for any mispronunciations of the names of the first nations communities.
Speaker 1 00:22:29 To hear more about these documents and be given a reflection prompt, stay at this stop and play the next track, or move on to the next stop, which is three meters behind you and play chapter nine. When you arrive chapter eight, treaty and map interpretation and prompts. This chapter provides interpretations and prompts for further reflection about the map of the Sudbury bedrock compilation from Canada's geological survey and a copy of the Robinson Huron treaty. The chapter is two minutes and 56 seconds long
Speaker 2 00:23:03 By providing these two documents. Joel helps us to reflect on interconnected components of land. These include the comment that hit Northern Ontario so long ago, and the resulting emergence of copper and nickel deposits within its rock today. The land is both a major mining area and the site of a debated treaty between the Ontario and federal governments and the Anishinabek nations of the lake Huron area, who are the descendants from the nations that entered into the treaty with the British crown. The treaty is also a government to government document signed between first nations leaders and the British crown. It was intended to make room for European settlement for first nations to share the wealth of the land in exchange for financial payments. But that first nations would retain the right to use the land for hunting and fishing. What is not known from just looking at the treaty?
Speaker 2 00:23:59 However, is that even though the agreement stipulated that the amount of annuities paid to first nations would increase the payments have not been increased since 1874 and remain at $4 annually in January, 2021. The case to fight this breach of contract entered into its third phase, the compensation owed to first nations communities will be determined in the coming years. This includes past payments owed as well as future payments though, the previous cases have been ruled in favor of the first nations. The government of Ontario has decided to appeal as the artist states. There are many different layers of knowledge and desire and expectation here, both the geological survey map and the treaty are material objects that explore land beyond its straightforward depiction and a photograph or painting for the artist. These documents represent different scales of the imperceptible. While snow lab scientists are searching for the imperceptible particles called dark matter. Joel's work points to other imperceptible elements like time relationships, natural resources and economies. Here's a reflection for you. Think about the land you're on now. What do you know about the history, geology and ecology of this place? Try to imagine the lives, relationships and politics that have played out across this place, hold these visible and invisible layers in your mind.
Speaker 1 00:25:44 This concludes the description of the map and treaty move to the next stop. Three meters away behind you play chapter nine. When you arrive chapter nine, the bulk frameworks one, this chapter describes Joel, Tom sculpture. The bulk, the chapter is two minutes and 17 seconds long. If he reach out gently, you may touch the slowly rotating sculpture.
Speaker 2 00:26:10 The final component of inland that we are examining is called the bulk frameworks. One, one of two large scale sculptures that are suspended from the 19 foot high ceiling in front of you. It is four feet by four feet by four feet and hangs three feet from the ground. The form of the sculpture is called a hypercube or N cube. Here's a more in-depth description. This large cube frame is created using silver slotted steel angle irons, which creates smaller cubes that interlock to create the whole piece. There are no faces to the cubes only edges. And although there are many overlapping metal pieces in the center, the gallery wall remains visible through the sculpture. The object hangs from the ceiling by one of its corners so that the square is turned 45 degrees.
Speaker 2 00:27:08 The main body of the sculpture consists of four cubes. Two stacked onto the interior of the form holds additional parallel and perpendicular angle irons. More angle irons come out from the two larger faces of the square. They come to a point that holds a Cornell lens, which is the size of an adult hand for now. Lenses are compact composite lenses that have a magnifying capability. They are used in lighthouses to amplify the interior light so that it is visible from greater distances. The metal is a hard dull gray with oval holes that repeat every inter. So along the entire length of each piece, the, for lens refracts, any light in the gallery, and there are rainbows inside it. As the sculpture rotates slowly with the help of a disco ball motor, it creates a flat, dense and changeable shadow on the wooden floor below
Speaker 1 00:28:09 To hear more about this sculpture, including interpretations and prompts, stay at this stop and play the next track. Chapter 10, otherwise move to the next artwork of the tour and play chapter 12. The next stop is in a room that is 20 meters away. The small arm of the gallery's L-shaped floor plan. Follow the path on the floor. Chapter 10, the bulk interpretation and prompts. This chapter provides additional interpretations and reflection prompts for the bulk sculpture. The chapter is three minutes long
Speaker 2 00:28:46 Throat. This installation, the artist's Dole Tom's has been playing with the concept of dimensionality and making space for multiple dimensions. Within our understanding of the universe, he is making a link to the ways of thinking used by physicists, who try to make sense of a universe where 84% of matter is undetectable. The title of this work is the bulk in physics. The term bulk is given to a hypothetical higher dimensional space within which the 11 dimensions of our universe may exist. The 11 dimensions are the three dimensions we can see plus time, plus the seven extra dimensions that we can't see, but that M theory theorizes are all around us.
Speaker 2 00:29:33 The artist's considers these sculptures as shadows of a seven dimensional artifact. The Greek philosopher famously used an allegory of the cave in which the shadows on the wall are a representation of a lesser dimension of reality. The only experience of reality that humans have access to think of the rotating frame as a shadow of a higher dimension reality that we live in, although it is imperceptible to us, are we meant to look into the Ferno lens into other dimensions, or does the lens project, those dimensions out to us in its entirety, Joel's installation and land. The holographic principle pulls our attention and multiple directions. He wants us to think critically about where dark matter scientists are working and how they're thinking. It is a kind of artistic investigation and experimentation like the experiments in snow lab, Joel attempts in multiple, sometimes indirect ways to understand the imperceptible yet inextricable forces that make up our world. The exhibition title drift draws from the mining term for a horizontal tunnel. In this case, it refers to the passageway in the copper and nickel mines, stretching from the mining elevator to the clean lab spaces of snow lab. We have been reflecting on the forms and energies that connect scientific research to art landscapes, cultures, and histories. It is also striking that the action of drifting is also too straight from a path or standard. We hope that this audio exploration of the intersections between art and science has felt like a journey off the beaten path.
Speaker 1 00:31:32 This chapter will recite the extended label for end land. The holographic principle by Joel Toms. It is written by curator sunny Kerr. It is three minutes and 19 seconds long. There are labels on the walls of the gallery for each artwork, which includes biographical information of the artist, the title of the artwork, and what materials were used here is Joel Tom's.
Speaker 2 00:31:57 Joel Tom's born Toronto Ontario in 1981, title and land the holographic principle, 2021 materials 4k video, 5.1 sound steel slotted angle sculptures with Cornell lenses, mirror ball motors, Robinson Huron, treaty library and archives, Canada RG, 10 volume, 1844 slash I T 1 48. Microfilm reel T dash 9 9 3 8 acid burn rocks from Sudbury landscape, Sudbury basin shatter cone rock sculpture from Sunbury science, north Sloan digital sky survey plugged plate from the collection of state fan korto. I assume more see prints sculptures of brass and rock source from submarines dynamic earth work desk with computer showing group portrait of snow plus detector video, the Robinson Huron treaty annuity case court documents, physics essays by Ning Kang song and Aaron Vincent Sunbury bedrock compilation map from Canada's geological survey, neutrino particles and shadows.
Speaker 2 00:33:19 The following is the extended label written by curator sunny cur Joel Tom's borrows, the imagery, materials, and strategies of physics composing them in an art context to probe the ecological ethics of our time. For example, borrowing a strategy from theoretical physicist. He plays with higher dimensions throughout his installation made explicit in his metal hypercube sculptures titled the bulk frameworks, the provocative flattening and layering of complex dimensional objects continues in his isomorphic prints in which he layers flattened 3d scans of snow lab experiments to expose gaps and hidden strata within scientific classification methodologies Tom's installation suggests a multi-dimensional view of the snow lab site, which he refers to as holographic reading context and agency through vast cosmic and geological timescales. The piece reflects on interconnected components of land. The comment that hit the location 1.85 billion years ago, and the resulting emergence of copper and nickel deposits within its rock. How the land is both a major mining site and the object of debated government treaties with indigenous peoples and how the rock itself isolate snow lab from the interference of surface radiation. So that experiments can search for rare cosmic particles.
Speaker 1 00:34:54 This concludes the description of Juul, Toms and land the holographic principle, move to the next artwork, blank spots by Nadia lick tick and play chapter 12. When you arrive, the first stop for this artwork is located in another room in the gallery. Follow the path for 20 meters, chapter 12, introduction to blank spots by Nadia elliptic. This chapter introduces the large installation by Nadia electric call blank spots. It is an installation that includes light and sound lasting 28 minutes curator, Sonny Kerr's commentary about the artwork can be found in chapter 15 or as a printed label on the,
Speaker 3 00:35:39 As you move towards the stop, perhaps you notice the soundscape of breathing or a chorus of voices. Welcome to Nadia Lytics, multimedia installation blank spots. Right now you're positioned close to a low square pedestal in the center of the room. If you recall, we describe the gallery as in the shape of a sideways L the part of the gallery where lit takes artworks are located is in the small arm of the L, but it feels like the biggest room because it has a two-story high ceiling. The room is almost 15 meters long and seven meters wide blank spots is on the floor in front of you. It is composed of six squares of cream colored canvas laid out to form a large rectangle. Each square is about two by two meters. So the entire work is huge. Over three by five meters, the squares of canvas are displayed on an ankle height wood platform with six spotlights hanging overhead, one above each square.
Speaker 3 00:36:37 It has the feeling of a stage in the theater, the spotlights Castlight directly on the squares of canvas intermittently illuminating several at a time softly blinking on and off in sync with the breathing and singing each square fabric has a different pattern though. The color scheme is similar shades of brown, some darker, and some lighter two squares feature pattern made from lines of short dashes. These were done using a technique called Photosh French for rubbing. When you were a child, did you ever make a rubbing of a leaf using a crayon and a piece of paper? This is the same action. Nadia used though. She hasn't printed the pattern of the texture of a four, perhaps pebbles or small bricks using graphite on other squares. The markings are more random in size and look like blotches or creases in the fabric. Different hues of brown overlap on the cream color of the canvas. These are stains created by the artist who use the fabric and cleaning liquids to hand-wash force, but not just any force. The artists chose locations where crime has occurred in places like Berman and Berlin in Germany, axon provosts, and Montpelier, and France and Zen mushed and posing in, in Poland,
Speaker 1 00:37:54 Moved to the next stop on the tour. About 10 meters away, there will be a wall on your left and the low wood platform on your right play. Chapter 13. When you arrive at the stop chapter 13, focus on the light of Nadia lick takes blank spots. This chapter invites you to focus on the light element in the artwork.
Speaker 3 00:38:17 Perhaps your breath started to get faster. When you learned that some of these canvas squares were made at places where crimes have taken place. Nadia does not tell us what these crimes were or who was involved. Only that they have occurred. She is trying to capture or record the indiscernible changes in when such an act has taken place. Move slowly away from the gallery wall and toward the race platform, stretch your arm out and hold it over the artwork. Can you feel the slight shift in temperature when the spotlight cast light on your skin? The artist plays with light and dark and warm and cool attempting to eliminate or capture something she knows has occurred, but cannot witness. She focuses her attention on the traces of the experience. Instead, for example, dust and markings on the floor, how does naughty his work connect to the themes explored in the drift exhibition, as she contends, even the neglected dust at crime scenes shares its atomic and molecular composition with plants and humans, even stars and galaxies. While dark matter, researchers looked at the galaxies. She scans the earth for the traces of matter that do not carry the aura of grand year. And Gloria associated with the stars
Speaker 1 00:39:30 Move to the next stop on the tour by using the wall on your left to guide you. This stop is back at the low square pedestal, about 13 meters away. Play chapter 14. When you arrive chapter 14, focus on the sound in that elliptics blank spots. This chapter invites you to touch the art installation and focus on it. Soundscape
Speaker 3 00:39:56 Facing the low square pedestal reached down to fuel. What is displayed on top of it? The pedestal is one by one meter and a half meter high. It holds six stacks of loose leaf paper. Each stack holds about 300 photocopies of one of the patterns from the canvas squares. You're welcome to feel how high the papers stacked afterwards. Spend some time listening to the soundscape that accompanies blank spots. What are the sounds, words and tones that you can identify sound is a critical element of this artwork. And in particular, the chorus of overlapping voices, sometimes speaking and sometimes singing the soundscape is broadcast from six speakers set on the gallery four. It creates an all encompassing atmosphere. Nadia is interested in expanding the ways that music is composed and performed the stacks of paper, actually record unique musical scores. She has created their unusual. One side of the paper holds a reproduction of one of the patterns from the squares over each one.
Speaker 3 00:40:58 She has written words, trace the outlines of some of the shapes or overlaid typed text. The other side of the paper is divided into two, an excerpt from a text that the artist is drawn towards and instructions for a song based on that excerpt, here's a description of, one of the scores on the pattern side of the paper. Nadia has outlined the main splotch with a dotted line so that it looks like a map of a country. She has drawn straight lines at different angles from one side of the paper to the other along each line is a word in cursive. So the words are difficult to discern. The word that appears most often is breath. The excerpt of the text on the score is from a book by Karen barod entitled meeting the universe, halfway quantum physics and the entanglement of matter and meaning published by duke university press in 2007.
Speaker 3 00:41:53 Here's what the text says to be. Entangled is not simply to be intertwined with another as in the joining of separate entities, but to lack an independent self-contained existence, existence is not an individual affair. Individuals do not preexist their interactions. Rather individuals emerge through and as a part of they're entangled interrelating, which is not to say that emergence happens once. And for all as an event or as a process that takes place according to some external measure of space and time, but rather the time and space like matter and meaning come into existence are iteratively, reconfigured through each interaction, thereby making it impossible to differentiate in any absolute sense between creation and renewal, beginning and returning continuity and discontinuity here and there past and future. And here's the score or instructions for the composition that is inspired by this text. It takes the form of a mathematical equation to be entangled for the lines, indicating words, apart from breath, singing each word, following its line.
Speaker 3 00:43:07 The intonation and pitch is varying depending on the size of the square. The line is crossing the smaller, the higher for the lines indicating breath, breathing quicker for the line, crossing smaller square, breathing slower for the line crossing bigger square interchanging X to Y to be repeated and times X plus S two plus a creation breath, breath, beginning breath, continuity, breath, breath here. Breath past breath, breath. Y T plus B one plus B two renewal breath, breath returning breath, discontinuity, breath, breath there. Breath. Future breath, breath creation, renewal breath, breath, breath, breath. Beginning returning breath, breath. Continuity, discontinuity, breath, breath, breath, breath. Hear their breath. Breath pass. Future breath, breath, breath, breath creation, renewal breath, breath, breath, breath again. Breath, breath. Granting breath, breath, breath here. Breath,
Speaker 4 00:44:39 Breath, breath creation, breath, breath, beginning breath, continuity, breath, breath, breath, breath, breath.
Speaker 3 00:44:56 How would this song sound to you? These instructions are for voices like soprano and tenor, but no instruments. It can be interpreted in many different ways, depending on how the equations are filled. Can you imagine it, even though you might never hear it, how would you compare the work by Joel Thompson and this one by Nadia there's resonance in the way that each artist combines and recombines and Lares modes of representation of unknown matters and intangible experiences. Can you relate these skills to how scientists explore invisible phenomenon? What other ways do you see the work of these artists intersecting with ideas of dark matter or of the search for things that can't be easily detected,
Speaker 1 00:45:41 Chapter 15, label information for blank spots by Nadia electric. This chapter recites the extended label for blank spots by Nadia elliptic. It is written by curators, Sonny Kerr and hangs on the wall beside the artwork. It includes biographical information of the artist, the title of the artwork and what materials were used.
Speaker 3 00:46:04 Nadia electric blank spots, 2021 ongoing for Taj on canvas theater, lights sound and digital sequence. 28 minutes collection of the artist. Blank spots is a series of photoshoots taken in a geographic location where traumatic historical events have taken place. The artist has cleaned the floor with canvas and cleaning liquids or copied the structure of the four. Using graphite for Tasha's from new locations will be added over time to this ongoing piece. The accompanying audio includes sounds of breathing rhythmic speech and singing a synchronized rhythmic sequence of sound and theater lighting, carefully frames and reframes. The photoshoot for lactic, not unlike a scientist, experimenting in Astro particle physics. The artist reaches into the dark looking for traces of ancient light scientists who study astrophysics in for the presence of dark matter. By studying galaxies experiments at snow lab, use the earth as a filter. Lik TIG is scanning the earth with blank spots, an investigation of in conspicuous neglected matter. Cosmologists tell us that the matter of which we are made the atoms and molecules that make up the plants, animals, oceans, and even all the other planets and stars is dust ejected from ancient exploding stars, blank spots, composes dust understood as remainders of experience. Indeed, the dust blank spots of Oaks is a poor dust, not carrying the aura or nobility and glory associated with the stars. The artists. Thanks, Juergen Carrie. Einen a dare reddish. And Mark Burke said for lighting technical support and sound technician, Christian boy zoo.
Speaker 1 00:47:57 This is the end of the tour for drift art and dark matter. The tactile floor markings will guide you back to the first stop. Thank you, chapter 16. Thank you. And credits this chapter concludes the tour and provides the thank yous and credits it is one minute and 17 seconds long. Thank you for joining us on this audio description tour of drift art and dark matter. If you use the tablet in the gallery, please return it to the front desk. Should you wish to listen to this audio description tour? Again, the audio files can be found and downloaded through a link on the gallery's website. This audio description tour was produced by Carlton university art gallery in collaboration with Carla and eight community consultants with low vision, it was developed as a creative access working groups, project funded by a Canada council for the arts sector innovation grant in partnership with critical distance center for curators and tangled art and disability. It was also supported by the main Jackson experiential learning fund. Drift art and dark matter is a residency and exhibition project generated by Agnes Etherington art center. The Arthur B. McDonald Canadian Astro particle physics research Institute and snow lab recording and editing is by Nicole Bedford. Voice work is by Ian McKellen, Fiona Wright, Frederick IMiD, and Ann Marie. I am a low, we value your feedback, please. Email comments and questions to Fiona dot
[email protected]
