IIN. DARIUS CIUTA
(Nephogram 2012)
‘IIN’ by Darius Ciuta is a soundwork built upon silences: natural noises layered in form of artificial silences.
The original audio sources have been carefully analyzed and processed in order to extract microscopic textural details that become Ciuta’s fundamental blocks, used to design silent architectures of noises. Silence and noise, and the contrast that arises from their combinations are the main treats of this audio work.
[Darius Ciuta photo courtesy of Menuduobe]
The contours of amplified microsounds are interspersed with electronic like intermissions defining a sort of continuos change of focus of the details, in fact it’s simply impossible to say what is background and what foreground. In this work everything is part of the sound, even the silence.
The overall impression while listening is to be immersed in a pool of water, where particles follow the rules of diffusion, establishing a diffusion flux that is proportional to the gradient of concentrations.
Is diffusion applicable also to the sounds? A distinguishing feature of diffusion is that it results in mixing or mass transport without requiring bulk motion. The same can be stated about the structure of ‘IIN’ where the sound seems to trace invisible paths within a complex and vivid sonic object. Brownian motion of the aural details.
Random drifting, random physical processes: noise for sure, but not harsh or “violent” noise. As a matter of fact here noise is regarded as in signal processing or computing, just random unwanted data. But unlike the real definition of noise in signal processing (“unwanted data without meaning”), in ‘IIN’ the “unwanted data” acquires meaning and depth.
The sound of ‘IIN’ is surprisingly articulate and perfectly demonstrates the maturity of the Lithuanian sound artist who is rapidly becoming well known in the field of electroacustic / concrete music.
‘IIN’ is also one of the first physical releases of Nephogram, an italian fine label with a magnificent catalogue and a wonderful digital (free) archive.
One of the best discs of the first half of 2012.
-Elliot Loe
