Robert Rauschenberg (b. 1925, USA – d. 2008)
Mud Muse, 1968-1971

Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden / Visited on 12/01/2020

I came to think of unexpected parallel between Rauschenberg’s Mud Muse and my Artificial Ignorance Choir (AIC). Rauschenberg lets sound recording to regulate air pressure causing the mud to bubble. The audience does not hear any sounds from the recording, only the sounds of the actual bubbling mud in the room. My AIC is also making digital information audible. And in both cases there is some circularity taking place – current installation of the Mud Muse is based on the record of its own earlier bubbling. My pieces are based on human words and algorithmically normalised idea of how they are supposed to sound. And in both cases there is a distortion – Mud Muse does not “play back” its previous recording precisely, just as AIC comes to distort the impression of human language it is trying to reproduce.

Yes, it is a rather far-fetched parallel. But there is something about different modalities of recording and playback, shifting between digital/electric and analogue, the original and the copy, anticipation and failure to meet it, normalisation and deviation – that is present in both cases and provides me with some interesting food for thought. Even if not fully digested yet – or, perhaps, ever…