n e w s the colour u

n e w s

09.05.2013 - Location: STeM Sint-Niklaas Belgium. The Listening City. Live performance by the colour U. STeM Sint-Niklaas Belgium 09.05.2013. European city sounds workshop and event with noTours and WIT Urban Team in Sint-Niklaas.Via participation of the residents and contributions of the European visitors the project will focus on an aural experience of the city and on the creation of a soundwalk with an alternative and creative tour of the city.

We have been working on tracks for a new traveling project in Europe 'Balkan Tales' for the Goethe-Institut [Athens], soundartist Enrique Tomas [Escoitar.org Spain] together with visual artist Stefaan van Biesen and poet Geert Vermeire have been working together as a trio.

Enrique Tomás [Lindz Austria], Stefaan Van Biesen [Belgium] and Geert Vermeire [Brasilia Brazil - Bruges Belgium] are working together on several projects connecting literature with sound art via new medias and interactive technology. After a pilot project and workshops in SMAK, Museum of Contemporary Art in Ghent and at E-Culture Fair in Hasselt, followed projects in several museums and important cultural venues in Greece, Macedonia, Kosovo, Albania, Germany [Museum Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz, Museum Deichtorhallen Hamburg], Belgium [BOZAR], Italy and Turkey. On this moment an interactive poetry video and sound installation of Enrique Tomás, Stefaan Van Biesen and Geert Vermeire is presented at the Bienal of Literature of Brasilia, the largest of its kind in South America.

Athens Greece & Europe 2012.
[Balkan Tales] Goethe-Institut Athens Greece. [Walking with Çelibi] a contempory sound travel in a Balkan Tale.

A contemporary sound walk inspired on the world traveler, Evliya Çelebi, an Ottoman Turkish gentleman adventurer who travelled far and wide for over 40 years, visiting over 250 cities. He described everything he saw on his journeys, and left a record of his wanderings in 10 large volumes, the Seyahatname, or Book of Travels, “the longest and fullest travel account in Islamic literature, perhaps in world literature.” It is a book full of fantasy, imaginary landscapes and invented itineraries in a world where travelling was still magical and mysterious. On the other hand he is a great geographer in the tradition of Strabo and Ptolemy. Historians have cross-referenced Evliya’s descriptions of Balkan mosques, public baths and Sufi lodges with the actual sites that still stand today, and found Evliya to be highly accurate. Our sound walk refers to both the magical as the documentary side of Evliya Çelibis travels, situated within the Balkan of today. An atmosphere of past wonder connects itself with the sounds of contemporary Balkan. Poetic soundscapes, originally composed for this sound walk, and field recordings of street music, city life and nature, all made on location in the Balkan, go along with the themes and photographs of the exhibition. The five themes of the exhibition a Balkan Tale are evoked in soundscapes, linked via five musical promenades guiding you from one theme to the other. Next to this flux of music and sounds while you walk around the exhibition, you can listen as well to a small sound portrait of seven photographs. Another aspect of the traveler Çelibi which inspired us to walk together with him in this journey of sound is his usually friendly attitude to non-Muslims. Meetings with many persons are an essential part of his Book of Travels. As Çelibi said many times when he was far from his home, he was perfectly happy to be a nedim [intimate fellow] to strangers, a musahib [boon companion] to other travelers and “a friend of all mankind.” Human presence and sounds of life are the thread of our sound walk, always in the light of the joy of living together. As Çelebi wrote from his heart, “Most important is the companion, then the road.”

Introduction : Evlyana Çelebi, World Traveller ⋈ Five themes : Conquering, Religion-worshipping, Living together, Modernising, Memory-forgetting ⋈ Five promenades Seven photographs ⋈ A sound walk by Geert Vermeire [writer, concept], Enrique Tomás [composer, sound artist] and Stefaan Van Biesen [sound artist].

Brasilia Brazil March 28 th to April 2012.

the Milena principle at the National Museum Brasilia Brazil.

“360 º travelling spaces” and “Anatomia da Escrita” two exhibitions of the Milena principle during the Bienal do Livro e da Leitura in Brasilia 360 º travelling spaces: a sound- and video installation inspired by “the unknown island “ of José Saramago [Enrique Tomás, Stefaan van Biesen, Geert Vermeire]. Pavilion B - Bienal, Brasilia / until 23d of April, 2012 Anatomia da Escrita : the book of wonderings/the book I am, works of Stefaan van Biesen, video-poems of Geert Vermeire National Museum of Brasilia, until 29th of april 2012.

Interactive technology developed by Enrique Tomás allows the public to become part of a panoramic sound and image experience of 360 º which moves with the orientation of the listener via a rotating chair. Four natural soundscapes of Enrique Tomás represent four atmospheres of the fairy tale and follow the movement of the listener. Speakers reproduce the audio contents that are mixed on an organic way, depending of the point where you are listening.

The experience occurs in a rhythmic dialogue with a panoramic projection of various videos, video poems, video-performances and soundscapes, created for this installation by Stefaan van Biesen and Geert Vermeire. The flow of the text by Saramago is rewritten in a flow of sound and image activated by a person in a rotating chair, symbolizing the searching man of the fairy tale, and is transformed into a travel to an inner world. The work of the three artists connects itself with the typical approach of Saramago, always looking for making the public conscientious, investigating and recreating situations that question the human expectations and anxieties.

Geert Vermeire and Stefaan van Biesen [the Milena principle] collaborated with Enrique Tomás on various projects that connect literature, visual arts and new media. Including geolocalization, movement technology, applications for portable screens [smartphone, gps] for among others SMAK City Museum of Contemporary Art Ghent in Belgium, and a travelling project for various cultural venues in five countries [City Museum of Belgrado, Museum Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz, Museum Deichtorhallen in Hamburg in 2012, and in BOZAR Brussels and the Historical Museum of Trieste in 2013].

University Braga Portugal & Saramago Foundation Lisbon Portugal

Sensitive Islands video and soundtrack

Simona Vermeire [university Braga Portugal] is working on an educational project based on a novel 'The Stone Raft' by Nobel Price Winner José Saramago. Sensitive Islands is a video with drawings and work of Stefaan van Biesen. The soundtrack April Fools was made for this project.

 

Hamme Belgium April 2012.

songs of the colour U as the soundtrack of a play.

Writer Do Van Ranst rewrote and directed a play for children 'the Blue Bird', an adaptation of the novel by the fin de sciecle writer and Nobelprice winner Maurice Maeterlinck. He integrated several songs of the colour U as: 'Silhouette', 'Seen', 'Magic' and 'Benazir'. A production of Ringtheater Hamme Belgium.

 

The Dresden Suite - Live at DACCA & Vitrapoint Antwerp Belgium 2011.

Adaptation of a live performance by Head wanderer at DACCA Belgium for the art project METAforen 28.08.2011. Soundtrack The Dresden Suite written by Stefaan van Biesen for the Milena principle performance 'Canto Indientro' for the Accademia Dantesca Jahnishausen in Germany, June 2011. The Dresden Suite performed live by Peter Maes and Stefaan van Biesen. Treated electric Guitars. See Video of the performance on our videopage. [Length: 20:59].

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