Antithesis by Disinformation

Faraday's Memorial is located close to Corsica Studios and celebrates the work of the legendary inventor and electro-genius. Here the memorial has been rendered in "glass" for added aesthetic effect, as this was how the architect Rodney Gordon imagined it would be, so all could see the inner workings of the electrical substation.

 “National Grid” sound installation recorded live at the Museum of Installation (art gallery), Deptford, London, July 1997, accompanied by AM radio noise from a DataProducts LZR 1260 laser printer, recorded 1999. The “Soundproofs” exhibition at MOI featured exhibits by Disinformation (credited as “Joe Banks”), Bruce Gilbert, Yavier Marchan and David Clegg, performances by Martin Creed and Owada, Disinformation and Hayley Newman, and a discussion featuring Robert Worby from BBC Radio 3.

 “Kwaidan, part 1” - electromagnetic noise with electronic percussion. Released on the Disinformation “Sense Data & Perception” CD, published by Iris Light Records, May 2005. “Kwaidan” (“scary stories” in archaic Japanese) was conceived in partial tribute to the book of the same name by Lafcadio Hearn, published in 1904, and to the film of the same name, produced by Masaki Kobayashi (with music by Toru Takemitsu) in 1965.

“National Grid” is a new realisation of the audio artwork, first published on the “Stargate” LP, released by Ash International, August 1996, performed live, at the Disobey nightclub, October 1996, and first exhibited, at the Museum of Installation (art gallery), July 1997. Where early realisations of “National Grid” featured electromagnetic noise from live mains electricity, “played” live, using the Upper and Lower Side Band filter on a VLF converted shortwave radio, later versions feature noise from live mains electricity, sourced directly from the outputs of a laboratory bench transformer. This output is subjected to microtonal re-tuning techniques, of the sort originally pioneered by the composer Giuseppe Tartini; and the version of “National Grid” recorded for the Schemata “Antithesis” exhibition features live mains electricity accompanied by electronic tanpura, spring reverb and virtual string quartet.

 “Kwaidan, part 3” - electromagnetic noise with electronic percussion and organ. Released on the Disinformation “Sense Data & Perception” CD, published by Iris Light Records, May 2005. “Kwaidan” (“scary stories” in archaic Japanese) was conceived in partial tribute to the book of the same name by Lafcadio Hearn, published in 1904, and to the film of the same name, produced by Masaki Kobayashi (with music by Toru Takemitsu) in 1965. “Kwaidan, part 2” was not released.

 “Artificial Lightning” - electromagnetic noise from photographic flash systems, re-recorded for the “Antithesis” exhibition, January 2022. The apparatus used to record “Artificial Lightning” provided the soundtrack for the sound and light installation of the same name, featured in the “Sonic Boom” exhibition at the Hayward Gallery, London, April 2000. Sonic Boom was curated by David Toop and Fiona Bradley, and featured sound installations by Angela Bulloch, Paul Burwell, Disinformation, Heri Dono, Max Eastley, Brian Eno, Paulo Feliciano, Greyworld, Stephan von Huene, Ryoji Ikeda, Philip Jeck, Thomas Köner, Christina Kubisch, Chico MacMurtie, Christian Marclay, Katarina Matiasek, Russell Mills, Mariko Mori, John Oswald, Pan Sonic, Project Dark, Lee Ranaldo (from Sonic Youth), Scanner, Paul Schütze, Rafael Toral and Ian Walton.

 “London Underground” - VLF band radio recording of electromagnetic field noise from the electric rail at Clapham South underground station, London, recorded 2002. Released on the Disinformation “Sense Data & Perception” CD, Iris Light Records, May 2005. The “London Undergound” and “Bexleyheath to Dartford” recordings are described in The Wire magazine review by Keith Moliné (guitarist from the band Pere Ubu) as “fascinating… like electron microscope images”.

“London Underground” - VLF band radio recording of electromagnetic noise from inside a moving train, travelling the Bank branch of the Northern Line, around Angel tube station, London, recorded 2009.

“London Underground” - VLF band radio recording of electromagnetic noise from inside a moving train, travelling the Bank branch of the Northern Line, around Angel tube station, London, recorded 2009.

 “Bexleyheath to Dartford” - VLF band radio recording of electromagnetic noise from inside a moving train, travelling the Network South East line of the London Overground, departing Lewisham station, recorded 2002. Released on the Disinformation “Sense Data & Perception” CD, Iris Light Records, May 2005. The “London Undergound” and “Bexleyheath to Dartford” recordings are described in The Wire magazine review by Keith Moliné (guitarist from the band Pere Ubu) as “fascinating… like electron microscope images”.

 “Ghost Shells” - VLF band radio recording of geomagnetic whistlers, produced by lightning strikes echoing around the earth-ionosphere waveguide. Released on the Disinformation “Ghost Shells” LP and “R&D” CD, published by Ash International, January and April 1996. The title refers to the phenomenon whereby German army field-telephone operators heard, in communications equipment, the “ghosts” of artillery shells, apparently whistling across the battlefields of WW1.

 “Ghost Shells” - VLF band radio recording of geomagnetic whistlers, produced by lightning strikes echoing around the earth-ionosphere waveguide. Released on the Disinformation “Ghost Shells” LP and “R&D” CD, published by Ash International, January and April 1996. The title refers to the phenomenon whereby German army field-telephone operators heard, in communications equipment, the “ghosts” of artillery shells, apparently whistling across the battlefields of WW1.
Recording re-processed 2022

 “Ghost Shells” - VLF band radio recording of geomagnetic whistlers, produced by lightning strikes echoing around the earth-ionosphere waveguide. Released on the Disinformation “Ghost Shells” LP and “R&D” CD, published by Ash International, January and April 1996. The title refers to the phenomenon whereby German army field-telephone operators heard, in communications equipment, the “ghosts” of artillery shells, apparently whistling across the battlefields of WW1.

 “Ghost Shells” - VLF band radio recording of geomagnetic whistlers, produced by lightning strikes echoing around the earth-ionosphere waveguide. Released on the Disinformation “Ghost Shells” LP and “R&D” CD, published by Ash International, January and April 1996. The title refers to the phenomenon whereby German army field-telephone operators heard, in communications equipment, the “ghosts” of artillery shells, apparently whistling across the battlefields of WW1.
Recording re-processed 2022

 “Ghost Shells” - VLF band radio recording of geomagnetic whistlers, produced by lightning strikes echoing around the earth-ionosphere waveguide. Released on the Disinformation “Ghost Shells” LP and “R&D” CD, published by Ash International, January and April 1996. The title refers to the phenomenon whereby German army field-telephone operators heard, in communications equipment, the “ghosts” of artillery shells, apparently whistling across the battlefields of WW1.

 “Ghost Shells” - VLF band radio recording of geomagnetic whistlers, produced by lightning strikes echoing around the earth-ionosphere waveguide. Released on the Disinformation “Ghost Shells” LP and “R&D” CD, published by Ash International, January and April 1996. The title refers to the phenomenon whereby German army field-telephone operators heard, in communications equipment, the “ghosts” of artillery shells, apparently whistling across the battlefields of WW1.
Recording re-processed 2022

 “Theophany” (meaning “the Voice of God”) is a recording of a single, very abrupt, VLF band radio impulse produced by a tropical lightning strike, extracted from the version of the “Ghost Shells” recordings that was released on the “R&D2” CD. Although earlier versions of “Theophany” were released as far back as the “A Fault in the Nothing” double CD, released by Ash International in 1996, this now definitive version of the “Theophany” artwork premiered at the Disinformation solo exhibition at Fabrica Gallery, Brighton, November 2001. The “Theophany” sound installation lasts just 0.083 seconds, and is the shortest sound installation in the world. A detailed discussion of the “Theophany” exhibit appears in the on-line art-science publication Clot Magazine, November 2020 - https://tinyurl.com/y4vp7wxl

 “9V DC Supply with Home-Made Copper Solenoid” is a recording of a (possibly unsuccessful) attempt to capture electromagnetic noise produced by the phenomenon of so-called ferromagnetic hysteresis. Released on the “Antitrade” CD by Ash International, 1999. “Antitrade” featured sonic art by HHH, Leif Elggren, Hazard, SETI, Disinformation, AER and Bruce Gilbert.

 “Electricity of the Mind” is a recording of EEG (electro-encephalograph) impulses, sourced directly from the mind of Disinformation producer Joe Banks. Recorded by Professor Mick Grierson, Electronic Music Studios, Goldsmiths College, London, 2008. The title is taken from the BBC Home Service talk “Recollections of Wyndham Lewis” by Geoffrey Grigson, The Listener magazine, 16 May 1957. The experiment during which this recording was made is documented on YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvyLWRzLWPc

 “R&D track 7” is a recording of unidentified VLF-band radio noise - of electromagnetic interference, possibly from the horizontal line oscillator in a CRT television. Released on the Disinformation “R&D” CD, published by Ash International, April 1996.

 “Celebration” is a purely digital remix composed from sounds entirely taken from a now lost ethnographic recording (origin presently unknown). Released on the Disinformation “Sense Data & Perception” CD, published by Iris Light Records, May 2005.

Description: “Untitled_Eye” - video test footage, created 23 September 2021. This video, as with other film works featured in the “Antithesis” exhibition, extrapolates the themes of earlier Disinformation sound works, exploring, however, not so much electricity itself, as much as the notion that perception is an electrically mediated biological system, and that video is a form of electrical sensory prosthesis. The Disinformation video artworks “Spellbound” and (to a lesser extent) “Ammonite” (neither shown in “Antithesis”) also exploit the psychological power of direct gaze - the sense that the artwork is watching the viewer rather than vice versa; and, similarly, the “Untitled_Eye” experiment resembles an element of the fictional Voight-Kampff Test depicted in Ridley Scott’s legendary science-fiction movie “Blade Runner” (released in 1982).

The “Scintillating Scotoma” video is an optokinetic artwork, which, like the “Untitled_Eye” test footage, also created September 2021, explores the notion that perception itself is an electrically mediated biological system. The video attempts to simulate the shimmering and flickering distortions which disrupt vision, when self-propagating waves of electrophysiological de-polarization reverberate across the cerebral cortex (the term was devised by the 19th century physician Hubert Airy, from the Latin “scintilla”, meaning “spark”, and the ancient Greek “skotos”, meaning “darkness”).

 “Ghost Shells” - VLF band radio recording of geomagnetic whistlers, produced by lightning strikes echoing around the earth-ionosphere waveguide. Released on the Disinformation “Ghost Shells” LP and “R&D” CD, published by Ash International, January and April 1996. The title refers to the phenomenon whereby German army field-telephone operators heard, in communications equipment, the “ghosts” of artillery shells, apparently whistling across the battlefields of WW1.

Abstract_Untitled - video test footage, created 7 July 2021. These videos consist of a highly kinetic stream of loops, created from images of high-voltage electric discharges, abstracted to the point where they resemble splashes of Chinese calligraphy ink (of the type that, if symmetrised into mirror images, could easily be used for the construction of Rorschach ink blots). The footage is constructed inside the “Antithesis” exhibition into the shape of a virtual cube, somewhat reminiscent of the brainwashing machine in Sidney J. Furie’s espionage movie “The Ipcress File” (released in 1965). Visitors can experience this cube from both the outside and from the inside.

The “Postsynaptic” video is an optokinetic artwork, which, like for instance the earlier Disinformation video “Ammonite” (not shown in “Antithesis”) explores the use of “generative” video techniques to create representational (as opposed to abstract) art. In this case “Postsynaptic” is intended to represent, at various speeds, the electro-chemical flood of neurotransmitters across a synaptic cleft. The title is inspired by the track “Synaptic Radio” - a Disinformation remix produced by electronic music project T:un[k] Systems, which appeared on the Disinformation “Al-Jabr” CD, published by Ash International in 1999 (“Al-Jabr” features Disinformation remixes by Evan Parker, Tactile, Jim O’Rourke, Simon Fisher Turner, Mechos, Lawrence Casserley and T:un[k] Systems).

Created in collaboration with film-maker Barry Hale, with image processing and editing by Disinformation producer Joe Banks, the “National Grid” video installation was commissioned for inclusion in the Disinformation solo exhibition at Fabrica Gallery, Brighton, November 2001. The (earlier) “National Grid” sound artworks consist, in whole or (more recently) in part, of electromagnetic noise from live mains electricity, while the “National Grid” video installation consists of film footage of UK National Grid transformer stations, processed through audio (rather than video) circuits, then intercut with random bursts of near-subliminal colour video.

Created in collaboration with film-maker Barry Hale, with image processing and editing by Disinformation producer Joe Banks, the “National Grid” video installation was commissioned for inclusion in the Disinformation solo exhibition at Fabrica Gallery, Brighton, November 2001. The (earlier) “National Grid” sound artworks consist, in whole or (more recently) in part, of electromagnetic noise from live mains electricity, while the “National Grid” video installation consists of film footage of UK National Grid transformer stations, processed through audio (rather than video) circuits, then intercut with random bursts of near-subliminal colour video.

Still images from the “National Grid” video installation, commissioned by Fabrica Gallery, Brighton, November 2001.

Still images from the “National Grid” video installation, commissioned by Fabrica Gallery, Brighton, November 2001.

Still images from the “National Grid” video installation, commissioned by Fabrica Gallery, Brighton, November 2001.

Still images from the “National Grid” video installation, commissioned by Fabrica Gallery, Brighton, November 2001.

The “Language [as] Meta-Technology" sound artwork was first exhibited as a gallery sound installation in the Disinformation solo exhibition at Sluice HQ, Hackney, London, for Passengers Offsite, November 2018, curated by Julie Hill. The exhibit was then presented (during Covid 19) as a “fully automated, medically sterile and autonomous kinetic audio installation” at White Box Gallery, Blackheath, London, July 2021, hosted by Frances Prokofiev and Graham High. Members of the public were able to scan large format prints of the “Language [as] Meta-Technology" QR Code, displayed in the gallery window, routing directly through to an on-line sound file, while the gallery window was itself turned into a loudspeaker, replaying the audio into the street outside. Factoring in the installation’s on-line marketing, from July to December 2021, the “Language [as] Meta-Technology" audio was downloaded 3,658 times.

The “Untitled_Oscilloscopes” video consists of “found” footage - almost certainly Open University programming, recorded on VHS tape by Disinformation producer Joe Banks, circa 1985. The footage depicts electrophysiological experiments, with oscilloscopes, a laboratory oscillator, scalp electrodes and paper chart recorder.

Remixes of the “Theophany” sound installation. Recordings processed 2022.

Disinformation + Strange Attractor perform “National Grid” live at Corsica Studios, Elephant & Castle, London, 19 November 2004 - performers Mark Pilkington + Joe Banks. The performance took place as part of the launch event for the book “Techngnosis” by Eric Davis, published by Serpent’s Tail. The launch also included a panel discussion featuring Eric Davis, Kodwo Eshun and Julian Vayne.

 “Ghost Shells” - VLF band radio recording of geomagnetic whistlers, produced by lightning strikes echoing around the earth-ionosphere waveguide. Released on the Disinformation “Ghost Shells” LP and “R&D” CD, published by Ash International, January and April 1996. The title refers to the phenomenon whereby German army field-telephone operators heard, in communications equipment, the “ghosts” of artillery shells, apparently whistling across the battlefields of WW1.
Recording re-processed 2022

 “National Grid” sound installation recorded live at the Museum of Installation (art gallery), Deptford, London, July 1997, accompanied by AM radio noise from a DataProducts LZR 1260 laser printer, recorded 1999. The “Soundproofs” exhibition at MOI featured exhibits by Disinformation (credited as “Joe Banks”), Bruce Gilbert, Yavier Marchan and David Clegg, performances by Martin Creed and Owada, Disinformation and Hayley Newman, and a discussion featuring Robert Worby from BBC Radio 3.