Here is a partial list of the installation works:
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Fount (2012)
2 channel Video, stereo sound, wood & cloth surfaces, computer, projector
Measurements: (approx 67”w x 32”d x 70”h)
Fount is a media installation work involving video projected on two perpendicular planes with audio projected through speakers or a sound dome. When there is no viewer the piece is silent and the image is blurred. The the presence of a viewer viewer brings it into focus and makes the sound audible.
On the top plane of a white pedestal that approximates the size of a bathtub, a horizontal image of a basin is projected. Centered and hanging about a foot above it is a vertical screen (36" x 14.5") on which a beaker pouring water is projected. The veiwer sees and hears water being poured into a vessel, which eventually fills and then disolves into an image of ocean. It is a short, time-based work that unfolds over an approximately 1 minute cycle. (Duration: continuous)
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Baggage Allowance (2010)
Media Installation with objects, video, and sound
Baggage Allowance (the installation) is part of a sonically and visually layered work focusing on the concept of baggage in all its literal and metaphorical permutations. Through multi-channel sound, interactive video, and sculptural objects, Baggage Allowance explores the connections between people and the belongings (and memories) they cart around. Drawing from Ms. Z’s extensive traveling and cartage experiences, text from found sources, and interviews with travelers who speak poetically about their memories of train travel and flying and their numerous baggage-related stories, the work touches upon the ball-and-chain-ness of dragging one’s things all over the world.The installation consists of multiple audio, video, and sculptural elements including a weeping steamer trunk, a mock X-ray machine that reveals secrets when bags pass through it, and a vintage suitcase inside of which lies a woman sleeping and worrying. The work premiered in a gallery exhibition at the Krannert Art Museum in Champaign, Illinois that ran January through May 2010.
Individual pieces from the installation can be shown separately. Selected descriptions follow:
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Suitcase (2010)
Mixed Media (antique suitcase, plaster, embedded speakers, single channel video, computer, projector)
Measurements: approx 23”w x 26”d x 23”h
Part of the larger work Baggage Allowance, Suitcase involves a small, antique suitcase (23" x 16" x 10") open with the video image of sleeping woman projected into it. The internal projection surface of the suitcase is molded so that the projected image has some depth and appears lifelike. Eminating from embedded speakers, one can hear a collage of whispered thoughts along with breathing sounds and the rustling of the blanket. (Duration: continuous)
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click for video |
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Weeping Steamer Trunk (2010)
Mixed media (antique steamer trunk, flat display & speakers, fabric, various found objects, Mac Mini)
Measurements: 42"h x 40"w x 14"d (when standing open)
Part of the larger work Baggage Allowance, Weeping Steamer Trunk is an antique steamer trunk that stands open with a blurred moving image pulsating through a cameo-shaped display. As the visitor opens the various drawers, images come into focus and audio is heard through speakers embedded in the trunk’s upholstery. Objects tucked in the drawers also become visible when the drawers are opened. A variety of objects are revealed including a tiny model of a Victrola, a drawer filled to the top with hair, an old throat ice bag, a small locket containing photos of my parents, a pair of white gloves, and a drawer filled with the old family photos.
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click for video |
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Bag X-Ray (2010)
Mixed Media (wood, conveyor belt, motor, flat display, camera, Mac Mini)
Measurements: 72”w x 26”d x 62” h (including pedestal)
In this part of the larger work Baggage Allowance, visitors are asked to place their bags on a moving conveyor belt. When a bag enters the enclosure a camera grabs its image. The computer analyzes it for size and shape, selects from a database of surprise images, and superimposes a size-appropriate object on the bag. There are some 30 possible objects including a pistol, an engraved knife, a chest x-ray with a beating heart, hypodermic needles, an Emmy, small live animals.
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click for video |
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Baggage Allowance (2010)
Medium: single-channel video, stereo sound
Measurements: variable (duration: 15:37)
Part of the larger work Baggage Allowance, this is a single channel video composition about baggage in wide HD with a collaged text score. Can be projected or shown on a display (on a wall or embedded in a pedestal)
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click for video excerpt |
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Parts of Speech (1998/2009)
Media Installation with objects, video, and sound
Parts of Speech (the installation) is an offshoot of Pamela Z's1995 radio work and 1996 performance work exploring language. It involves objects (found and made), projected image, and multi-channel audio segments. Some of the pieces within this installation were created in 1998 during the year of the Theater Artaud performance, and addtional pieces were made for a solo "Parts of Speech" exhibition at the Chico University Art Museum in 2009.
Individual pieces from the installation can be shown separately. Selected descriptions follow: |
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Parts (1998)
Mixed Media (found cloth-bound grammar books, speakers, 4 channels of audio)
Measurements: variable (4 "speakerbooks" averaging 4"w x 6.5"h x 3"d)
(Duration: continous)
From a larger work Parts of Speech, this is a four-channel sound installation comprised of four small cloth-bound grammars with small speakers mounted on the front covers. They hang in a formation that surrounds the listener. Each has a channel of audio containing speech fragments that randomly combine to make sentences, as the the four channels play in concert.
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Parts of Speech (1998)
Inkjet-printed transparencies, stereo sound (speakers, sound dome, or headphones)
Measurements: variable
(Duration: continous)
From a larger work Parts of Speech, this is a stereo sound installation comprised of nine 10” x 8” transparencies each printed with a part of speech. They are hung at about eye level across a wall spaced evenly apart to create a sentence diagram. (Alternatively the text could be painted or vinyled directly on the wall.) A pair of headphones or a sound dome is hung at a good viewing distance from the wall (or a pair of speakers is mounted on either side of the text on the wall.) A series of randomly generated sentences is played with each word spread across the stereo field to match up with the position of the appropriate part of speech. Though meaningless, the sentences are all grammatically correct.
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Sonic Gestures (2007)
Multi-channel Video and Audio
Measurements: variable
(Duration: continous - 18 minutes looping)
Sonic Gestures is a video installation that premiered in April 2007 at Recombinant Media Labs in San Francisco. Consisting of ten frame-locked channels of HD video composed of fragmented gestural images and 16 channels of audio, Sonic Gestures surrounds the audience with a virtual chorus of chattering, whispering, singing, and ever transforming sonic entities. This piece, which was commissioned and presented by NexMap, was designed as a site-specific piece for the immersive 360º video and sound set-up at RML.
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click for video |
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Lift (2005)
5.1 surround sound installation
(Duration: continous)
Lift is a multi-channel, site specific sound installation commissioned by the Tang Museum in Saratoga Springs, NY for their "Elevator Music" series. The piece involves layers of sound recorded in various elevators with samples and voice-overs recorded in Pamela Z's studio. Lift had its premiere at the Tang Museum November 2005-January 2005, where it was exhibited in the museum's ample elevator. Quoted from the installation wall commentary from the exhibition at the Tang:
"You enter a small chamber; the doors seal behind you. When they open again, you find that your surroundings have changed. The change can be so complete and abrupt that it’s startling. An entirely different color scheme, a complete set of new sounds and aromas, the sudden presence of a person or people, or the sudden absence of anyone. The erection of an entirely new set of walls, or the replacement of existing walls with open air. Or the change is very slight. The differences so subtle that they are barely noticeable. But, something is clearly different. At first, it’s just a feeling. But closer inspection reveals that a single word or character on a sign has changed. The temperature is a few degrees warmer or cooler. A quiet buzzing sound has become just a little louder. There’s a small chair or a wastebasket. The light level is a bit brighter. Someone you can’t see is whispering. There’s a faint chemical smell."
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Forensic Art (2002)
Performance/installation
with Video
(Duration: continous)
This performance/installation
exploring physical identity, perception, and the act of spontaneous verbal
description premiered at The Exploratorium as part of an exhibition called
"Sight Unseen". People are invited to either enter one booth where they sit one minute
for a camera, or to to enter another booth where they view a face,
that appears for one minute on a video monitor, and describe it in detail (as if for a police artist). These descriptions and faces are recorded and then played back together on a large display and speakers visiable to the public.
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Timepiece Triptych (2008)
Surround sound installation: 2008 (total duration: 22 minutes or continuous)
Timepiece Triptych is a suite of multi-channel sound works exploring time-related processing on vocally-produced sounds. Various time-altering digital processes including extreme time-compression and time-expansion, delay, granular syntheses, reversal, and reverb are applied to spatialized layers of text fragments and brief melodic material. The only sound sources used in the three segments are Pamela Z's voice and (in Syrinx) the voices of birds. The suite is comprised of three sound works that can either be cycled consecutively on the same 4-channel system or individually on three proximate, but acoustically separate systems.
i Declaratives in the First Person
ii Syrinx
iii De-Star Spangled Banner
Declaratives in the First Person
Six-channel sound installation: 2005 (duration: continous)
Declaratives in the First Person (2005) was originally created as a six-channel audio installation for an exhibition entitled "The Art of Artist Statement" at the Hellenic Museum and Cultural Center in Chicago. The work was composed of three stereo pairs of varying lengths playing through 6 speakers surrounding the listener– all looping continuously to create ever-shifting layers of sound, so that one could listen all day without ever hearing the exact same combination of fragments. In response to the exhibition's subject matter, Z sampled her own voice speaking this sentence: "I would like to think that the art itself would be enough of a statement." The text was then cut into fragments, compressed, expanded, and layered in various combinations. A stereo mix of one possible iteration of the six channels can be heard here.
De-Star Spangled Banner
Four-channel surround sound installation (2008) duration: 10:19 (or continuous)
De-Star Spangled Banner is made entirely of samples from a leftover artifact of a project Pamela Z did with conceptual artist Kelly Heaton. Ms Z describes the work this way: "Samples of a time-expanded recording of my voice singing a bel canto rendition of The Star Spangled Banner are processed to create varied lengths and then densely layered. Pitch correction is consistently used whenever the time is expanded or compressed, resulting in a palate of sounds that remains completely within the pitch range of the original melody. Embedded in the texture are passages of the anthem stretched to as much as 35 times it’s original length so that, if played in its entirety, the normally under-two minute song would become fifty minutes in length. The opening phrase “O say, can you see”, which normally takes approximately 4 seconds to sing, lasts for a full two minutes in some of its iterations here. Likewise, there are samples where the time is compressed to the extent that the entire anthem takes only five and half seconds from beginning to end. My vibrato (which is already so wide you could drive a truck through it) forms incredible hills and valleys when stretched, and creates a kind of warbly underwater opera sound when compressed. I found that, when layering the longer stretched passages, I not only achieved a good deal of the customary beating one generally gets from phase-shifting, but the clashing of my hideously wide vibrato morphs quite convincingly into air-raid sirens, vacuum cleaner motors, and bad refrigerator compressors. When heard un-layered, these same stretched passages sound more like crying or plaintive moaning".
Syrinx
Four-channel and Eight-channel surround sound installation: 2004
Syrinx is a multi-channel sound installation based on samples of birdsongs. To create this work, Pamela Z slowed down a birdsong numerous times in Pro Tools until its individual pitches and melodic material were revealed. She then learned to sing the melody and sped her voice up until it was the same length and pitch as the original birdsong. The piece is made from multiple layers of the various permutations of the birdsong and the human interpretation of it. She originally created it in a four channel version for an exhibition called "Sound Migrations" at the Pacific Design Center in Los Angeles (2004), and later revamped it as an 8 channel (plus sub-woofer channel) work for the "New Sound New York" exhibtion at the Kitchen Gallery in (2004). A shortened, live two-channel version also exists as a small segment of the performance work Voci, leading into a section called "Bird Voice".
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Just Dust (2008)
six-channel site specific sound installation: 2004 (total duration: 11:30 minutes or continuous)
Just Dust is a six-channel audio installation created by Pamela Z for for Dak'Art Biennale. Originally exhibited at the Maison des Esclaves on Gorée, Just Dust combines layers of spoken text in English, French, and Wolof with sampled concrète sounds recorded during a December of 2003 site visit to Dakar. Through language and sound, Just Dust chronicles the artist’s first visit to Dakar.
Speaking voices: Pamela Z, Alassane Paap Sow
Additional sampled voices: Joseph Ndaiye, Koyo Kouoh, Amina
French tranlsation: Thierry Rosset
Wolof translation: Alassane Paap Sow
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Metal/Vox/Water (2001)
two-channel video installation (with amplified metal): 2001 (total duration: 12:00 minutes or continuous)
Two monitors (one horizontal & one vertical) display two separate, coordinated feeds of video and audio
edited from footage shot of Pamela Z manipulating, singing, and interacting
with the an amplified metal sound installation she created in her studio
during a residency at Tryon Center for Visual Art. The third componant
of the trio is her live perfomance with vocal processing and samples. This piece can also be shown with the metal sculpture hanging in proximity. |
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Pamela Z: Fount (2012)
back to list of works
Fount is a media installation work involving video projected on two perpendicular planes with audio projected through speakers or a sound dome. When there is no viewer the piece is silent and the image is blurred. The the presence of a viewer viewer brings it into focus and makes the sound audible.
On the top plane of a white pedestal that approximates the size of a bathtub, a horizontal image of a basin is projected. Centered and hanging about a foot above it is a vertical screen (36" x 14.5") on which a beaker pouring water is projected. The veiwer sees and hears water being poured into a vessel, which eventually fills and then disolves into an image of ocean. It is a short, time-based work that unfolds over an approximately 1 minute cycle. (Duration: continuous) |
Pamela Z: Suitcase (2010)
back to list of works
Part of the larger work Baggage Allowance, Suitcase involves a small, antique suitcase (23" x 16" x 10") open with the video image of sleeping woman projected into it. The internal projection surface of the suitcase is molded so that the projected image has some depth and appears lifelike. Eminating from embedded speakers, one can hear a collage of whispered thoughts along with breathing sounds and the rustling of the blanket. (Duration: continuous)
|
Pamela Z: Weeping Steamer Trunk (2010)
back to list of works
Part of the larger work Baggage Allowance, Weeping Steamer Trunk is an antique trunk that stands open with a blurred moving image pulsating through a cameo-shaped display. As the visitor opens the various drawers, images come into focus and audio is heard through speakers embedded in the trunk’s upholstery. Objects tucked in the drawers also become visible when the drawers are opened. A variety of objects are revealed including a tiny model of a Victrola, a drawer filled to the top with hair, an old throat ice bag, a small locket containing photos of my parents, a pair of white gloves, and a drawer filled with the old family photos.
|
Pamela Z: Bag X-ray (2010)
back to list of works
In this part of the larger work Baggage Allowance, visitors are asked to place their bags on a moving conveyor belt. When a bag enters the enclosure a camera grabs its image. The computer analyzes it for size and shape, selects from a database of surprise images, and superimposes a size-appropriate object on the bag. There are some 30 possible objects including a pistol, an engraved knife, a chest x-ray with a beating heart, hypodermic needles, an Emmy, small live animals.
|
Pamela Z: Baggage Allowance (2010)
back to list of works
Part of the larger work Baggage Allowance, this is a single channel video composition about baggage in wide HD with a collaged text score. Can be projected or shown on a display (on a wall or embedded in a pedestal)
(Duration: 15:37)
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Pamela Z: Parts (from Parts of Speech) (1998)
back to list of works
From a larger work Parts of Speech, this is a four-channel sound installation comprised of four small cloth-bound grammars with small speakers mounted on the front covers. They hang in a formation that surrounds the listener. Each has a channel of audio containing speech fragments that randomly combine to make sentences, as the the four channels play in concert.
(Duration: continous) |
Pamela Z: Sonic Gestures (2007)
back to list of works
Sonic Gestures is a video installation that premiered in April 2007 at Recombinant Media Labs in San Francisco. Consisting of ten frame-locked channels of HD video composed of fragmented gestural images and 16 channels of audio, Sonic Gestures surrounds the audience with a virtual chorus of chattering, whispering, singing, and ever transforming sonic entities. This piece, which was commissioned and presented by NexMap, was designed as a site-specific piece for the immersive 360º video and sound set-up at RML.
(duration 18 minutes) |
