MTV for La Tourette
MTV for La Tourette is a compilation of five short videos, which were all shot in Sainte Marie de La Tourette, a Dominican Order priory near Lyon, France. The monastery was built by well-known French architect Le Corbusier in collaboration with mathematician, composer, and architect Iannis Xenakis.
In “Perspectives emouvantes,” the video camera follows the movement of a driving car. The gaze is directed through the car window, which follows the scenery through a peaceful, very ordinary French countryside. The idyllic, almost drowsy, situation is underlined by Xenakis’s music, which adds tension and expectations of “endlessness” to the image. When the car stops, the image dissolves and the music fades.
In “Music for windows 1,” a musician is playing on the fenestration wall in the hall of the Monastery. The camera/viewer is placed outside. There is a certain disconnection and misunderstanding between the two positions, which is manifested by a slight delay in the sound.
The fenestration was designed by the composer Iannis Xenakis according to a specific geometrical order. He was using the same principle of geometrical order in his music at that time. Windows became a physical representation of his music. It is an example of the literal translation of the music into architecture, the translation of what we hear into what we see. With the video of the musician using this fenestration wall as an instrument, I join together the two phenomenological experiences.
In “Music for windows 2,” a static camera follows the movement of the drumsticks from an angle where neither the musician nor the instrument is visible. The sound is coming from in-between the concrete columns. Only if one precisely concentrates on the sound can one tell what sound it is and its origin. The experience of what we see is different from what we hear. The videos “Music for Windows 1” and “Music for Windows 2” work together as an installation.
In “Corridors” and “Refectory” there is no clear, conventional division between private and public space, as we would expect. The video image tries to keep visual privacy by not seeing the presence of the people in the space shown on the video. In the first, cinematographic movement follows the direction of longitudinal (fênetre en longueur) windows in the “endless” corridor, looking into the sky. The movement is followed by the sound of a person walking. The image of the private room is disturbed by the sound from a public toilet. In the second, the only place that functions in a conventional way is the refectory where people meet for meals at the conventional time; then the sound is finally synchronized with the image.
# 1 “Perspectives Emouvantes” 1996, music by Iannis Xenakis, video, 3:45 min.
# 2 “Corridors” 1996, video, 2:51 min.
# 3 “Music For Windows 1” 1997, music by Kees Van Zelst, video, 2:19 min.
# 4 “Music For Windows 2” 1997, music by Kees Van Zelst, video, 3:32 min.
# 5 “Refectory” 1996, video, 9:20 min.
Rijksakademie Van Beeldende Kunsten, Amsterdam