The Infinite Swell at Battery Townsley

Resonant site-specific performances by Chris Duncan, Travis Johns and Jim Haynes at a historic battery fortification in the Marin Headlands in partnership with the National Park Service. Co-curated by Jorge Bachmann.

Soundwave ((6)) Water takes you into the wilderness for a sonic adventure like no other. High up in the hills of the Marin Headlands, overlooking the Pacific Ocean, lies a structure steeped with history, Battery Townsley at Fort Cronkhite.

The dramatic acoustics of the fortification create infinite swells of sound. Artist Chris Duncan reverberates the sights and sounds of an oceanic cave just north of Battery Townsley while using the sonic possibilities of ice; and artist Travis Johns’ ‘Hydroprinting II.’  a participatory installation featuring an invented sonic instrument, creates unique sonographic art prints from water currents from underwater sound reverberations in the Battery’s battleship gun pool. Jim Haynes’ ‘To Dispel and to Dissipate’ uses corrosion and its poetics: he incorporates water as a chemical agent, fluid medium, and sound conductor that amplifies the residual sonorous qualities of water as it turns from a liquid into a gas. The vaporizing water amplifies the vibrations and frequencies from adjacent metal, glass, wood, rock, etc. to whistle, to rattle, to mold, to shatter, to collapse.

Note: Arrive at the latest 5:30 pm to the Rodeo Beach Parking Area and park at the far end closest to the fire road gate. There is a 20-30 minute uphill hike to the event location.

Beginning promptly at 6:00 pm, this outdoor event is on top of a hill overlooking the ocean and is windy and foggy. Bring warm winter jackets, hats & gloves, blankets and hiking shoes, even during warm & sunny conditions at the entrance on Rodeo Beach.

Chris Duncan is a multi-media artist whose use of repetition, accumulation, sound and reflections, along with a wide variety of materials (tape, crayons, string, mirrors, rocks, records, plaster) experiment with ideas of perception, transcendence and experience. Often in flux between maximal and minimal, Duncan’s work is a constant balancing act of positive or negative, loud or quiet, solitary or participatory…and so on. Chris was born in Perth Amboy, NJ, and currently lives and works in Oakland.

 

 

 

“I rust things.” This statement has been at the center for Jim Haynes’ work for over a decade. His first investigations into rust and decay evolved into working with mangled surfaces and corroded objects constructed from wood, paper, metal, glass, light; he discovered a means of re-activating the photosensitive properties of silver gelatin prints and embedding distressed copper and steel into the surface of the photographs. Haynes has explored how decay parallels and relates to the perception of time when cycles of activity dwindle toward stasis; concurrently, sound has emerged as a central medium for installations and performances. In the Bay Area, Haynes has exhibited at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Electric Works, The Exploratorium, Works, and Varnish. He has also exhibited at Westspace (Melbourne), Diapason (New York), Jack Straw Productions (Seattle), Eyedrum (Atlanta), and The Fugitive Art Center (Nashville). He is the Director for 23five, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the development and increased awareness of sound arts within the public arena. Through 23five, he co-curated the 2003 San Francisco Electronic Music Festival and the 2007-2012 season of Activating The Medium Festival.

Travis Johns is a composer and sound artist currently active in the United States and Costa Rica. Using processed field recordings, prepared instruments and home-built analog electronics, he creates pieces that blur the lines between performance, composition and installation, often using the environment and biological processes as inspiration for his works. He holds a B.M. in Technology in Music and Related Arts from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music (where he studied with Tom Lopez), and an MFA from Mills College in Electronic Music and Recording Media (where he studied with Chris Brown, Les Stuck and Hilda Paredes). Selected residencies include the Atlantic Center for the Arts and RPI’s Create @ iEar. His work has been featured at el Museo Centroamericano de Arte Video (MUCEVI), the Electronic Music Foundation, Ear to the Earth, Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA), el Museo Nacional de Costa Rica, Espacio G (Guatemala City), and Bienarte 8 (Costa Rica). In 2013 he represented Costa Rica alongside visual artist Paulina Velazquez-Solis at the BAVIC 8 Visual Arts Biennial of the Central American Isthmus, at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Panama City.