CORRESPONDENCES
2023 · Live AV show and image manipulation
‘Correspondences’ is an ongoing collaborative project and conversation between Soundwalk Collective and Patti Smith that has spanned over 10 years and across multiple geographies, uncovering the sonic steps left by poets, film makers, revolutionaries and extraordinary events that have taken place in specific locations.
Soundwalk Collective’s founder Stephan Crasneanscki has explored remote places all over the world to record and collect extensively in order to establish a sonic grammar that is underpinned by instrumental experimental compositions. All in the effort to create a musical space for Patti Smith to inhabit with her own poetry and voice. This ongoing resonance between the artists is expanded by ample studio recordings and experiments.
From a collaboration with TBA21-Academy exploring the destructive impact of seismic airguns and human interventions in the oceans, to the resilience of Nature in the aftermath of the Chernobyl disaster, to the decentralised societies envision by Peter Kropotkin, to the wastelands of Pasolini’s last night – the pieces presented are an immersive audiovisual journey, a travel to a sonic cinema, a soundscape to an invisible movie.
Featuring live films and director’s cuts, ‘Correspondences’ is performed by Soundwalk Collective’s Stephan Crasneanscki and Simone Merli, Patti Smith, Diego Espinosa Cruz Gonzalez, Lucy Railton and Nicolas Becker with live visuals by Pedro Maia
Photos: Parcifal Werkman / Pieter Kers / Rewire Festival
LIVE
23/10/2023 Rustaveli National Theatre, Tbilisi GE
15/04/2023 Teatro Colón Bogotá, Bogota CO
15/04/2023 Volksbrune, Berlin DE
09/04/2023 Rewire Festival, The Hague NL
··· more to be announced
EVIDENCE
2022 · Live AV show and image manipulation
Centre Pompidou brought together Patti Smith, Stephan Crasneanscki and Simone Merli from Soundwalk Collective, for a unique live performance on 22 October 2022 as part of their exhibition ““Evidence”.
“Evidence” is an audio and visual montage that traverses the work of Arthur Rimbaud, Antonin Artaud and René Daumal in their journeys to new horizons. Stimulated by these metaphysical voyages, the musical and sound composition of Perfect Vision is the starting point for this new multidisciplinary exhibition, collectively designed by Soundwalk Collective and Patti Smith for the Centre Pompidou.
PERFECT VISION by Soundwalk Collective & Patti Smith — with Nicolas Becker, Diego Espinosa, Oriana Gidi and Leonardo Heiblum — Sitar Roopa Panesar — live video Pedro Maia
LIVE 22.10.2022, Centre Pompidou, Paris – France
“Evidence” is a poetic, immersive journey, an ode to a world without borders, a contemporary reflection on the infinite and universal, a spiritual quest for unity as a living and life-giving presence. The physical, sound and visual voyages of Soundwalk Collective enter into infinite dialogue with the poetic trajectories of American musician and poet Patti Smith, creating a new vision and language through this exploration. Between audio, films, abstract images, objects and creations collected throughout their travels, this exhibition guides the public through a vast exploratory installation that juxtaposes photos, texts and original works by Patti Smith, from her personal collections and the Musée National d’Art Moderne and MoMA collections. As a testimony to the existence of these poets and their inspiration, it offers true immersion into their spirit and art.
Between 2019 and 2021, Stephan Crasneanscki and Patti Smith worked together to create Perfect Vision, a triptych of albums that draw inspiration from the texts of three iconic French poets: Antonin Artaud, Arthur Rimbaud and René Daumal. At the heart of the work is the necessity for these poets to travel to different horizons, to discover a new vision and perspective of themselves and their art. Recorded respectively in the Sierra Tarahumara in Mexico, the Abyssinian Highlands in Ethiopia and the peaks of the Himalayas in India, these albums are based on the idea that each landscape holds sleeping memories, testimonies to the passage of humans. Produced in collaboration with Grammy award winner Russell Elevado, Leonardo Heiblum, and Simone Merli, member of Soundwalk Collective, each album retraces the footsteps of poets, leading us through sound and musical landscapes, revisited by the incantatory voice of Patti Smith – https://www.centrepompidou.fr
* Exhibition includes a few images manipulated by me