DIGITAL ART TALKS, RECORDINGS & READINGS

Here you can read about projects released and watch streamed art talks on our webpage in May 2020, as part of oB1's spring program PUBLIC SOUNDS. One work by participant Alexander Rishaug, and two projects by Øystein Wyller Odden were presented as part of oB1's spring program PUBLIC SOUNDS.

The sound works by Alexander Rishaug and Øystein Wyller Odden have a quality that lends itself to direct experience, and, interestingly, were recorded in buildings that represent political power in Norway: the offices of Oslo’s power (City Hall) and the former offices of the prime minister and government (H-blokka).

For his project, Y(59 ° 54'54.76 ″ N 10 ° 44′46.03 ″ Ø), Norwegian artist Alexander Rishaug has conducted sound recordings in the Norwegian government quarter. The recordings were made over two nights in October 2017. The work can be seen as a sonic portrait of the abandoned building’s current state of haunted emptiness, an emptiness which connects to the events of July 22, 2011.

The work was launched here on Monday, May 25th at 7 pm-00 am. The streaming lasts for one hour and was accessible from 7 pm until midnight.

You can now stream the album for free on streaming services such as Spotify, Tidal, Apple Music, Bandcamp etc. We recommend listening with headphones or external speakers.

For osloBIENNALEN, the recordings were released on a double LP, distributed by Motto Books. The double LP can be bought at Tronsmo Bokhandel, Filter and Baklengs in Oslo, and at Mondo Books in Tromsø.

The project was carried out in collaboration with Hagelund / Christensen and with the support of KORO / URO.

Read more about the artist here.

Read more about the project here.

oB1 invites writers and critics to write essays for each of the biennial projects often before the work has been completed. Author and literary scholar Tore Stavlund wrote an essay on Alexander Rishaug's project. A staff member of oB1 reads a selected excerpt from the project essay, have a listen below.

Click here to read the full essay by Tore Stavlund.

In connection to the spring program, we asked five curators, teachers and musicians for their best tips (and a possible tutorial) on how to best listen to sound artworks such as the works in PUBLIC SOUND. Read "Put on your ears!" here.

As the first part of PUBLIC SOUNDS two works by Øystein Wyller Odden was presented online here on oB1's webpage. Read more about the projects below, followed by two ART TALKS that were held in connection with the launch.

Power Line Hum (Composition for the Organ in Oslo City Hall) takes as a starting point the history of the pipe organ in Oslo City Hall. When the building was raised, the elaborate pipe organ that was originally planned was deemed too expensive and was replaced by a Hammond organ. However, the pipes remained as decoration, a “silent facade,” and, for Power Line Hum (Composition for the Organ in Oslo City Hall), several were made functional by the organ builders Ryde & Berg. A wind system was installed to give air to the pipes and the Hammond organ was refurbished. The work contains the sound of these two organs, the previously silent and its electronic replacement, each playing the same chord. 

The work was played over the course of several months in Oslo City Hall and reproduced the low humming bass sound made by electricity at a frequency of 50 Hz. This low hum, with the resonances and harmonics it creates in the fuse box, has been transcribed by the artist for reproduction on the organ.

The reproduced hum of the current is the sound of modern society and enters into a dialogue with the social-realist art of previous eras presented in the City Hall.

The video showed fluctuations in the electric power frequency during the recording session held on June 1st 2019 from 5:39:09 p.m. to 6:15:34 p.m. in the Main Hall of Oslo City Hall. The musicians reacted to changes in frequency in response to a musical score developed in collaboration with composer Jan Martin Smørdal.

Power Balance is based on the hum of the power grid, alternating current with an approximate frequency of 50 Hz. This frequency is not completely stable but changes subtly, shifting slightly above and below 50 Hz as a direct result of shifts in supply and demand in the energy market. When the population consumes a lot of electricity, the frequency goes down and production must be increased; likewise, production must be lowered when consumption is low.

This sound is also the sound of money; the Municipality of Oslo is Norway's second largest power producer through the city authority’s full ownership of E-CO (formerly Hafslund), and so owns large power plants all over southern Norway.

The piece is built around a piano that is tuned to resonate at 50 Hz, so the strings are tuned to 50 Hz as well as to its overtones (100 Hz, 150 Hz, 200 Hz, etc.)

Read more about the artist here.

As part of the spring program's release of works by Øystein Wyller Odden, two art talks were held on and about the projects, their content and process of development.

In connection with the online launch of Øystein Wyller Odden: Power Balance (Composition for Piano, Alternating Current and Orchestra), osloBIENNALEN FIRST EDITION 2019-2024 held a conversation between artist Øystein Wyller Odden, composer Jan Martin Smørdal and curator Per Gunnar Eeg-Tverbakk.

The conversation was moderated by Benedikte Rønsen, Public Outreach Coordinator at oB.

In the conversation, we will hear about the context and background of the work. We will touch on the works various thematics, as well as how the work was developed in a collaboration between the artist Wyller Odden and composer Smørdal.

The concert in Oslo City Hall was first held in 2019, in a collaboration with Ultima - Oslo Contemporary Music Festival.

This conversation was held in Norwegian.

This art talk asks questions, such as:

Join artist and composer Øystein Wyller Odden, oB1 co-curator Eva González-Sancho Bodero, and editor, critic and oB1's head of communications, André Gali for an online talk about communicating art in the public space and the public sphere. Moderated by Amanda Kelly, associate director of Pickles PR.