Xth Sense: Omnious

"Ominous (OMN) is a sculpture of incarnated sound. The piece was commissioned on occasion of the finals of the 5th Live Electronic Music Project Competition, organized by the European Conference of Promoters of New Music (ECPNM). The performance embodies, before the audience, the metaphor of an invisible and unknown object enclosed in my hands. This is made of malleable sonic matter. Similarly to a mime, I model the object in the empty space by means of whole-body gestures. By using my visceral, new musical instrument “Xth Sense”, the bioacoustic sound produced by the contractions of my muscle tissues is amplified, digitally processed, and played back through nine loudspeakers. The natural sound of my muscles and its virtual counterpart blend together into an unstable sonic object. This oscillates between a state of high density and one of violent release. As the listeners imagine the object’s shape by following my gesture, the sonic stimuli induce a perceptual coupling. The listeners see through sound the sculpture which their sight cannot perceive. OMN is an hommage to artist Alberto Giacometti. The piece is an interpretation of a recurrent topic in his work, that of “a constant irrational search and movement towards an unknown object” (Saint Louis Art Museum, 1967). This theme is embodied in the threatening, bronze-casted sculpture Hands Holding the Void, which is the inspiration for this performance. Also known as The Invisible Object (1934-1935), the sculpture consists of a human-like figure combining natural and abstract traits, which seems to hold an invisible object. Its body rests in an unstable position and its suffering gaze seems about to explode in a loud cry." Source: Artist project page