ArtistInfo

Brian Siskind
Niterói, Water That Hides

Album 2015 on Beat Hollow Records label
Electronic (Abstract, Ambient, Dark Ambient, Experimental)

Sound installation at the Frist Center for the Arts
 October 11, 2013 - January 12, 2014 Brian Siskind
 Niterói, water that hides, 2013
 Akai MPC 2000xl and vinyl records Created by Nashville composer Brian Siskind, Niterói, water that hides (2013) is named for the densely populated and impoverished city of Niterói near Rio de Janeiro, at the edge of which Niemeyer’s stunning contemporary art museum looms over an azure bay. The sonic component, which Siskind describes as “a collage of mid-century/post-war orchestral vinyl recontextualized into a dark, deep and teeming sound environment,” is a perfect embodiment of the rich discordance of urban experience, in Brazil and around the world. 
- Mark Scala, Chief Curator / Frist Center for the Visual Arts Frist Center exhibition increases atmosphere with music 7:40 PM, Dec. 5, 2013 Stepping into Ana Maria Tavares' "Airshaft (to Piranesi)" is like being suspended in an aquamarine-tinted virtual world of infinite spaces. The walls seem to recede, the highly reflective black floor seems to drop away and an atmospheric soundtrack fills the space. This installation is the first time the 2008 piece has been paired with music. It's part of "Deviating Utopias," an exhibition of Tavares' work at the Frist Center of the Visual Arts through Jan. 12. Tavares was interested in working with an experimental composer, one who shared "her fascination with fragmentation and reconstitution of the given," Frist Center curator Mark Scala wrote in an email. Artist and curator chose Nashville-based composer Brian Siskind after viewing a video of him performing an original composition in the Rothko Chapel in Houston." I had to take these abstract cues, the historical precedent, and then the aesthetic and general function of what she was making or had made," Siskind said. Since Tavares often references Oscar Niemeyer's mid-century modernist architecture in her native Brazil, Siskind took passages and sounds from 1950s classical albums ("clicking and popping" included), then layered and sequenced them to make "Niteroi, water that hides." The resulting composition works so well with "Airshaft" it's difficult to imagine the piece without it." For me, the quality of floating - not just optically but viscerally - is one of the most the affecting aspects of 'Airshaft.' Brian's composition intensifies this," Scala wrote. "His combined sounds express detachment, of being unmoored in a distorted space that conflates architecture and water." While Siskind wanted to be true to Tavares' vision, he also wanted to create a "stand-alone listening experience." - MiChelle Jones, for The Tennessean

Musicians

Brian Siskind , artwork by, engineer, mastered by, mixed by, photography by, producer, sampler, album by

ArtistInfo App

Acknowledgements

ArtistInfo for Mac, iPad, and iPhone