Energies, not Forms, not Figures

Rebecca Collins with Adam Matschulat
Energies not Forms not Figures, 2023
Digital Audio Piece, 20 minutes in four parts
Funded by Royal Society of Edinburgh, Grant no. 1827


Energies not Forms not Figures is an audio work in four-parts combining performance writing with field recordings and interview extracts from Rebecca Collins’ visits to the Canfranc Underground Laboratory and to the Astroparticle Acoustic Research Group in Gandia at the Polytechnical University in Valencia. The creative process with Adam Matschulat evolved from an initial conversation over a steamed latte at Café OTO, London in July 2022. Ideas discussed included references to sounds of the everyday that shift reorienting the attention of the listener, the absurd and Samuel Beckett. A conceptual twist to the piece makes use of an excerpt from J.S. Bach’s, Brandenburg Concerto No. 2 in F Major, 1. included on The Sounds of the Earth the Golden Record sent by NASA aboard Voyager I and Voyager II. Whilst the record is intended for the ears of extraterrestrial listeners on unknown planets, Collins and Matschulat, aim to engage the ears of those on planet Earth with the intention of attuning our attention to that which is already around us.

Rebecca Collins is an award-winning artist researcher, whose work focuses on methods of listening, performance, sound, and creative/critical writing. An underlying concern within her work is how critical, fictional or performative interventions can intervene in the everyday, thus cultivating attention to our contemporary condition. She completed a PhD in Performance Studies at Aberystwyth University and since 2017 is Professor of Contemporary Art Theory at the University of Edinburgh. In 2022 she received a prestigious scholarship from the Royal Society of Edinburgh for her project 'Parameters for Understanding Uncertainty' and has spent a year as artist-in-residence at the Institute of Theoretical Physics (IFT UAM-CSIC). The works featured in the exhibition are a direct result of this investigation. Her first book co-written with Johanna Linsley, Sonic Detection: Necessary Notes for Art and Performance will be published by Punctum Books in 2023.

Adam Matschulat is an award-winning London-based Brazilian composer, sound designer and engineer. His sound works include electroacoustic composition, musique concrete, field recording, and structural noise music. His compositions explore psychological states, rendering such investigations into sonic experiences. Matschulat has worked under a number of monikers. The first EP released under his own name came out on Café OTO's TakuRoku label. His debut LP Formosa is out in March 2023 with London-based record label Calling Cards Publishing.

Interview material from conversations with Aaron Vincent, Theopisti Dafni, Carlos Peña Garay. Exhibited in collaboration with the music laboratory (CPSIM-UAM) with thanks to José Luis Carles Arribas, Adolfo Nuñez, and Germán Labrador.