Revivification - Video Documentation

Revivification By Guy Ben-Ary, Nathan Thompson, Stuart Hodgetts, Matt Gingold in collaboration with Alvin Lucier What happens to the artists’ creativity once they have passed away? Can the essence of a performer be retained if the person is no longer physically present? Situated within debates around human agency and the impact of generative AI, Revivification is an attempt to immortalise the late experimental composer Alvin Lucier (1931-2021). The project gives him new life by creating a biological 'surrogate performer' – a living autonomous entity that keeps on creating, long after his death. Lucier was a sound art pioneer whose approach to composition profoundly altered contemporary music as he emphasised the mental labour involved in making and engaging with sounds over virtuosic performance. Importantly, in his work Music for Solo Performer 1965, he became the first artist to use brain waves to compose and perform music. In 2020 Lucier donated his blood cells towards realising the Revivification project. With his permission, the artists transformed them into stems cells and then differentiated them into cerebral organoids. These are biological structures that have the capacity to change over time in response to stimuli and can be thought of as ‘mini brains’. Revivification features these in an immersive audio installation in which both musical ‘action’ and ‘perception’ are unified via a bioelectric system. Conceptualised with Lucier himself, the sound environment focuses on sonic resonance and reflection, both phenomena that he explored throughout his career. The neural activity of his in-vitro ‘brain’ is extended into the space via electromechanical mallets that respond to these signals by striking large, hand-crafted brass plates. Microphones throughout the space ‘perceive’ these tones which are then fed back to the ‘brain’ via electronic neural stimulation, a closed-loop system that allows it to constantly adapt and compose new work in the gallery space. Revivification speculates that Lucier's creative essence may persist beyond his death. The project asks uncomfortable questions such as: what is measurable and immeasurable in the creative agency of an artist? And could their ‘surrogate performer’ uncover and express creativity of, and on their own? Revivification was actively developed with Alvin Lucier prior to his death, and continues to be supported by his family and Estate. #Revivification #AlvinLucier #Lucier #SurrogatePerformer #InVitroIntelligence