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“Every manifestation of our life is accompanied by noise. The noise, therefore, is familiar to our ear, and has the power to conjure up life itself.” (Russolo, 1986, 1913)

Today almost every manifestation of our life is accompanied by some form of digital communication. Surveillance and security systems track our physical movements, electronic funds transfers, telephone, email, SMS, web surfing, and wireless networking are the digital noise of daily life.

This noise is either ‘tuned out’ or not considered at all as we go about our business and focus on the ‘content’ of the mediation or the ‘outcome’ of the transaction. In the construction and presentation of digital media, however, the line between content and background operations, structure and processes is often completely dissolved.

To both analyse and construct digital works we must appreciate the ways in which these ‘background noises’ function.

The genre of ‘alternate reality’ or ‘mixed reality’ gaming has powerfully shown us how our everyday digital signals may be tracked, manipulated and synthesised by new media works to conjure up alternate, ‘artificial’ life - unfiction.

“Although it is characteristic of noise to recall us brutally to real life, the art of noise must not limit itself to imitative reproduction. It will achieve its most emotive power in the acoustic enjoyment, in its own right, that the artist’s inspiration will extract from combined noises.” (Russolo, 1986, 1913)

While the creation or recreation of a large scale alternate reality is not the aim of my work, I believe that this genre gives us a great example of what is possible when the complete spectrum of ‘digital noises’ is embraced and its various manifestations combined. Artists such as Jonah Brucker-Cohen show us how digital ‘background noise’ such as network traffic and everyday mouse movements may be appropriated to create interesting new works.

Russolo, L. (1986, 1913). The Art of Noises: Futurist Manifesto. The Art of Noises: Monographs In Musicology No. 6. New York, Pendragon Press.

Links:

Luigi Russolo: The Art of Noises

Russolo, L. (1986). The Art of Noises: Futurist Manifesto. The Art of Noises: Monographs In Musicology No. 6. New York, Pendragon Press.

unfiction.com

cloudmakers.org

Jonah Brucker-Cohen: coin-operated.com

“At first the art of music sought purity, limpidity and sweetness of sound. Then different sounds were amalgamated, care being taken, however, to caress the ear with gentle harmonies. Today music, as it becomes continually more complicated, strives to amalgamate the most dissonant, strange and harsh sounds. In this way we come ever closer to noise-sound.” (Russolo, 1986, 1913)

Digital audio, video and photography began as grainy, low resolution, glitchy re-mediations of their analogue predecessors. As the technologies were developed and advanced they began to approach, and then surpass the detail and quality of their analogue cousins. Sound cards can now record multiple channels at 192khz 24bit, video cameras can shoot in HD and digital still cameras can capture 11 megapixel images. Depending on their content, these media may ‘caress’ the eyes and ears with the ultimate in ‘pure’ sounds and images.

“We Futurists have deeply loved and enjoyed the harmonies of the great masters. For many years Beethoven and Wagner shook our nerves and hearts. Now we are satiated and we find far more enjoyment in the combination of the noises of trams, backfiring motors, carriages and bawling crowds than in rehearsing, for example, the “Eroica” or the “Pastoral”. ” (Russolo, 1986, 1913)

While the kind of technology required to produce hyper-real, ‘Industral Light and Magic’ style visual effects, and ‘Skywalker Ranch’ sound is increasing in accessibility and popularity, at the same time, artists are increasingly exploring the aesthetics of the artefact, the glitches and noises produced as a by product of data compression, signal downsampling, bit reduction and error. This ‘digital lo-fi’ aesthetic can be found in the sound art, video art and digital photography.

Just as Russolo preferred the sounds of everyday life, it could be argued that low-fi, glitchy, digital samples represent and reference our daily digital lives. The sounds of digital mobile phones dropping out, CDs skipping, computers crashing, digital television losing reception, images from camera phones and webcams serve as inspiration for the glitch aesthetic.

Tony Scott : beflix.com - glitch on paper

Iman Moradi : Glitch Aesthetics

Glitch (music) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Luigi Russolo: The Art of Noises

Russolo, L. (1986). The Art of Noises: Futurist Manifesto. The Art of Noises: Monographs In Musicology No. 6. New York, Pendragon Press.