Acetate - Impermanence and Destruction Within Sound Art

Abstract

This paper will discuss two installation pieces created for acetate vinyl and multiple turntables. The two works Wow&Flutter and Collision should be considered as spatially immersive, generative, and interactive sound sculptured objects that investigate degrading surface material and remediation as the basis for a structural composition. The turntable has been regarded as a legacy technology but has recently seen a resurgence even among emerging technologies such as 'XR' 'Network Art' and 'Live Coding'. This paper will discuss how the turntable is itself a dialogic key between mediation and materiality of sound. It's tactile and kinaesthetic nature invite interactivity in a very unique and singular manner. Firstly, I will address correlational aspects by developing the conceptual and aesthetic context in an effort to delineate and explain the term Sound Art before addressing the affordances of the creative use of the turntable. I will then explore how prominent artists conflated this medium's initial purpose and telos before going on to discuss the concept of Repetition as Aesthetic. This will be followed by an in-depth commentary of the use of acetate material in terms of investigating real-time recursive disintegration of analogue sound recording on this soft and malleable material. Intermediality and reappropriation of sonic material will also be discussed in relation to the compositional approach with a particular emphasis on Plunderphonics.