Study #40 is a generative audiovisual collaboration between LIA and the experimental music collective @c (Miguel Carvalhais and Pedro Tudela).
The work explores the interplay between narrative sound and abstract imagery. While the audio composition suggests concrete events—rain, mechanical rhythms, or the atmosphere of a road movie—the visuals remain strictly geometric. Circles, rings, and ellipses distort along the vertical axis, creating a visual rhythm that parallels the audio without illustrating it directly.
The work is distributed by Sixpackfilm and has been exhibited at the National Museum of Women in the Arts (Washington D.C.), the Lentos Kunstmuseum (Linz), and the Netherlands Media Arts Institute (Amsterdam).
Study #40 (2006), generative audiovisual work. Curated excerpt.
Selected generative outputs.
The Concept
A few geometric elements – circles, rings, ellipses – accompany the events of the soundtrack. There – in the sound – one seems to make out narrative elements: a car ride, rain, later ambulance noises, medical devices. The image level, however, remains abstract, but plays with associations – for example, when the circles distort elliptically along the vertical image axis, similar to the light of street lamps when viewed from the windshield of a moving car. One almost sees what one hears without being able to see it. A road movie or simply a successful abstract study on imagination and suggestion.
Text by Gerald Weber (Translated from German)
Project Details
Year Created: 2006
Medium: Generative Audiovisual Work / Single-Channel Video
Duration: 9’57”
Format: 720 x 576
Creative Collaboration
Sound: @c (Miguel Carvalhais & Pedro Tudela)
Museum Exhibitions
Lentos Kunstmuseum, Linz, Austria (‘See This Sound – Promises in Sound and Vision’, Aug 28, 2009 – Jan 10, 2010)
National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington DC, USA (’20th Anniversary Festival’, Sep 25 – 30, 2007)
Netherlands Media Arts Institute, Amsterdam, Netherlands (‘Crosswire’, July 5, 2008)
Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington DC, USA (‘Colorfield.Remix’, May 30, 2007)
Distribution & Selected Screenings
Distributed by: Sixpackfilm
MIAF – Melbourne International Animation Festival, Melbourne, Australia (‘Australian Center for the Moving Image’, June 16 – 22, 2008)
Elektra Festival, Montreal, Canada (‘Festival Screening’, May 9 – 13, 2008)
EMAF – European Media Arts Festival, Osnabrück, Germany (‘Festival Screening’, April 23 – 27, 2008)
Sonic Acts Festival, Amsterdam, Netherlands (‘Festival Screening’, February 21 – 24, 2008)
30th Starz Denver Film Festival, Denver, USA (‘Festival Screening’, November 10 – 18, 2007)
Sonar Festival, Barcelona, Spain (‘Optofonica Showcase’, June 14 – 16, 2007)
Diagonale, Graz, Austria (‘Festival of Austrian Film’, March 19 – 25, 2007)
