Scrolling to Zero (2018/2019)
Live concert for church organ and electronics or sound installation or online meditation,18’ video, sound (stereo or Quadraphonic)
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It’s the end. Evaporating… or leaking. Downloading… byte by byte.
Rendering – breath by breath. Listeners. We are organised organs. An organism. We are the sound. Organised sound.
The piece/installation is a collective sound meditation on the word END, a sound ritual for the organ, electronics and audience voices led by a digital avatar. It has been described as follows: “(…) In the post-molecular world, in the era of Anthropocene, defined by the threat of nuclear annihilation as well as by the political and ecological catastrophe, humans as a species have clashed with an immense void. Lacking any objective, their annihilation pending. Scrolling to zero has already begun. The sum of experiences of people who meditate the void in a group is greater than the void itself. (…) It is in this experience that the ethical proposal of a new awareness and responsibility for inter-relationship is contained. Thus, one should not fear the moment of collapse. Each being and species will be replaced by another” (Zak Hall, darkNet edition v201017).
Apart from the full organ version intended for sacral spaces, the piece can also be performed in a chamber version for synthesizers and electronics, in an acousmatic installation version or as an online meditation.
Video: Marek Straszak
Rafał Zapała
Composer, sound artist, improviser (piano, drums, electronics) with a PhD and post-doctoral degree in music, professor at the Academy of Music in Poznań.
Thanks to his experience in counterculture and collaborations from different artistic disciplines, Zapała moves beyond the boundaries of music acquired through academic education (he holds a PhD in music composition and MA in choir conducting). His works are presented at contemporary music festivals, in jazz clubs, experimental music venues and open urban spaces.
He was an artist-in-residence at Stanford University–CCRMA (01-03/2014), Zamek Culture Centre in Poznań (2014), Świętokrzyska Philharmonic in Kielce (2014/15), ZK/U Berlin (2016), and Vertigo STARTS (2019), among others. Founder of Kołorking Muzyczny, founder and chair of an_ARCHE New Music Foundation as well as a number of music ensembles and projects (performing composed as well as improvised, electronic and experimental contemporary music).
His original idea of Live Electronic Preparation (LEPTechnique) was published as a chapter in the Oxford Handbook of Interactive Audio (Oxford University Press, 2014). A special place in his art is occupied by sound interventions and installations embedded in the urban space, such as Sensorium (monumental installation at ZAMEK Culture Centre’s clock tower, Poznań) and Post-Apocalypsis (gold medal for the Polish pavilion for Sound Design at the Quadriennale in Prague, 2015).
Project presented during the Digital Cultures Festival:
Scrolling to Zero (2018/2019)
