Spirit of Place
Progress??
Theatre for the Listening Mind, and the Thoughtful Listener.
Progress?? is a quick piece of narrative Audio Art is made from a selection of the Found Sounds around Whittlesea, Victoria supplied by composer colleague, Gary McKie, during a residency he calls The Whittlesea Sound Project.
Whittlesea, Australia, has been swallowed up by the growing outskirts of Melbourne, Victoria. Gary’s Found Sounds were recorded both in the natural environment, a major shopping shopping centre, and the ordinary daily sounds heard in a typical Aussie suburban backyard.
the project’s creative brief
“The Whittlesea Sound Project is about discovering, or reconnecting to, the diverse sounds around us, as COVID-19 restrictions continue to ease, and we venture back into our communities throughout the City of Whittlesea and beyond.
Consider how being aware of the sounds around you effects your connection to place and ask yourself, “is there anything in my environment that could be changed to improve the quality of sounds and the way we are living?”
This project is supported by the Whittlesea Creative Community Fund.
MY CREATIVE ADVENTURES IN AUDIO ART, POETRY, AND MUSIC COMPOSITION
Here I share my work and play. Please browse freely and enjoy.
Full of great plans to comprehensively chronicle all my original work, but the improvisational nature of a creative’s daily life, means that items will gradually appear when the time is right among the warp and weft of other tasks.
*Links to places that sell my scores and recordings can be found in My Music Shop.
Rare Earth Cure*
*36 words arranged on a single page so that reading the lines from left to right in the ordinary way presents the essential ideas driving the man-made moves on the planet’s ecology in the 20/21st centuries.
Reading the bold text vertically spells out three words which encapsulate the
changing existential relationship between human and planet.
The first two name the two geological eras that concretely inscribe evidence of man’s
existence within the Earth itself as human impact becomes more extreme. The terminal
letter of each line represents a dawning era of hope, through spelling out the collective
name for ‘rare earths’ in the periodic table of chemical elements. Curiously, far from
being scarce, these essential molecules are found in multiple combinations in many
locations on Earth; their rarity lies in the way they hide in and among each other.
Recently, individual elements have been re-badged as ‘bio-minerals’ since they were
‘discovered’ to be useful in curing human cancer. Given that cancer is caused by the
over-production of one single type of cell, my naming of a new era for our ‘rare Earth’
suggests we can use our growing knowledge with regard to the total ‘footprint’ of the
human race to judiciously remedy the outcome of past practices.
The theme for the debut Earthwords Anthology is Voices of Nature.
PRAYER POCKET PLACE moves into Mt Kembla
Prayer Pocket Place gained permanent residency in the Mt Kembla Heritage Centre on 17 December 2014.
The Mt Kembla Heritage Centre is the keeping place of historical records and memories of the hardships faced by miners who worked in Mt Kembla coal mine, and their wives and families who lived in the Mt Kembla village. The Heritage Centre contains records of the mining disaster of 1902 which killed 94 miners and two rescuers in Australia’s largest ever industrial accident.
The impact on the women of Mt Kembla inspired Flossie Peitsch to design and co-ordinate the construction of the quilted fabric house and the individually sewn pockets. Many local women made their own prayer pockets to contain their personal thoughts and prayers.
A collaborative installation of the fabric house created by Flossie Peitsch and audio art composed by Ceridwen Suiter, Prayer Pocket Place, was short listed for Meroogal Women’s Art Prize and selected for exhibition in Shoalhaven Art Gallery, Nowra; Lady Denman Museum in Huskisson NSW; as well as the Belconnen Arts Centre, ACT.
The installation was welcomed to it’s permanent home at the Mt Kembla Heritage Centre by the chairperson Elizabeth Roberts in a small informal ceremony followed by lunch in the museum. We were delighted to be entertained by well-known Mt Kembla playwright Wendy Richardson who has written about the close-knit Mt Kembla community and effects of the mining disaster.
Click below to hear a one minute segment of the CD length audio art composed by Ceridwen Suiter, from on-site recordings collected from the social and mechanical sounds of the makers constructing their individual pockets during a communal lunch and workshop..
steps to . . .?
Is the growing city really progress or is it closing the door on old ways which might still be of value?
This 1 minute question mark premiered at Federation Hall, Melbourne, 9th July 2014…. as part of the 60*60 project curated by Susan Frykberg & Warren Burt for Australasian Computer Music Conference (ACMC2014).
Fine Hand-made Field Recordings carefully selected for piquancy.
Recorded and Composed by Ceridwen Suiter
EisforExpression
Technology Inspired Visuals/Soundscape by Ceridwen Suiter and Flossie Peitsch.
The Gallery exhibits itself as a post-conceptual place where ‘Artistic Expression’ squares off against ‘High Art’. Galleries amass reputations and memories as exhibitions come and go. This work taps, denotes and speaks the volumes from the gallery’s collective memory. Transitory expressions that have passed through its doors appear to linger. As surprising and distinctive forms emerge from the walls one can actually hear ideas pulse and roll to the auditory surface of the space.
Oct 8th – Oct 19th, 2013 ANU FOYER ART GALLERY
College of Arts and Social Sciences Building 105, Childers Street
The Australian National University; Canberra ACT T: +61 2 6125 5841
Prayer Pocket Place at Belconnen Arts Centre October 2012
PRAYER POCKET PLACE: For Heart, Hearth and Hand
Collaborative Artists: Flossie Peitsch and Ceridwen Suiter – together with many community fabricators.
Media: Mixed assemblage of aluminium, textiles, wicker, with soundscape and audio equipment.
This multi-sensory installation created by visual artist, Flossie Peitsch, and sound artist Ceridwen Suiter, features fabric and sound contributions by many women in workshops over a six month period at various locations along the South Coast.
This collaborative work literally and figuratively represents women in community.
STIRRING
Featuring music composed from a single sound found in the acoustic ecology of the filmed environment. Made by Ceridwen Suiter in collaboration Elizabeth Eastland (filmmaker).
Stirring will be shown as part of the Seensound 2012: a three-part Visual Music Series curated by Brigid Burke and Mark Pederson
7.30pm Wednesday May 2, 2012
at Loop Bar,
23 Meyers Place, Melbourne.
Entry $10/$5 also includes works by other artists
* * * DR WENDY (CERIDWEN) SUITER * * * 