‘The Wire’ is based on a piece of broken brake cable found lying in the 100-foot road, Arumbakkam, Chennai on 11-08-2015.
  
At the center of this work lies an act of transcription. An object (a discarded brake cable wire) is taken from a physical space and translated (or transcribed) onto a sonic space. I’ve mapped the three dimensions of length, height, and depth onto a primary set of parameters that define the sonic realm: frequency, amplitude and time. Later, by means of a type of reverse transcription carried out on a 3D printer, the object is returned to the physical world, though altered and distorted.   

I consciously made no effort to color - with my own sonic preferences - the performers’ interpretations of the initial mapping of the object in sound. Instead, I have tried to maintain an “objective” approach towards the re-creation of a visual experience of the wire in the sonic realm and vice versa.   

The performance of the sonic interpretation of the wire is executed in two movements in the piece. The violin score of the brake cable is developed with the help of a photograph, which in the process adds another level to the transcription. The second movement captures the background of the photograph and places it against the violin transcription of the brake cable.

The work done to generate this recording and the objects that result from it does not fit comfortably in the conceptual world of music composition, nor does it fit entirely comfortably in the fundamentally physical space of an art gallery. But, these acts of translation are merely two steps in a much longer chain of similar translations starting from my walk in Chennai to yours in the art gallery.  


Exhibition: This work is intended to be exhibited in a project space. The exhibition involves the display of the wire, a digital music station with headphones, which can play the pre-recorded versions of the piece by different artists, and a display of the 3D print outs of these multiple recordings.

Composed by: Nakul Krishnamurthy
Recording: Violin - Jimmy Bunch; Keyboard: Hrisheek Ganesh

The Wire, Mvt II

Excerpt from performance with Ryoko Akama at No Bounds Festival 2019, Kelham Island Musuem, Sheffield on 12.10.2019.

No Bounds 2019 - Ryoko Akama, Nakul Krishnamurthy - Excerpt

Excerpt from performance at HangarBicocca, Milan on 13th June, 2019. This piece was a part of the project 'Against Method' conceived by Mark Fell and curated by Pedro Rocha as a response to Sheila Gowda's exhibit 'Remains'.

Original Composition: Nakul Krishnamurthy
Performance: Nandini Muthuswamy (Carnatic violin), Nakul Krishnamurthy (electronics).

Nakulasya