Tim Cowie
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Super Everything*

In July 2014 we were commissioned by WIRED Magazine to create a new interactive media art installation as part of  Bentley Motors Night Call event in the historic Wind Tunnels at Farnborough Airport. This prestigious event celebrated British design and engineering excellence with the launch of Bentley’s new Continental GT V8 S. This was the building where Bentley had tested its original V8 powered car design back in 1957 and the building had been abandoned for many years and only recently opened up for events. We instantly fell in love with the building and its history, however it was a very quick turnaround for such a large scale project and our ideas had to be achievable in a short time frame.

Our response to this challenge was to explore the relationship between sound, space and energy while referencing the building’s long history of aeronautical design and engineering.The resulting piece was a sound reactive video installation built with custom software in Openframeworks that uses a realtime fluid dynamics engine to distort and manipulate a set of vector fields. We designed and developed this custom software to allow us to visually map this huge space and to create a playful interactive piece that would engage the audience at the event while they walking through the tunnel.

We used a set of six 20k Full HD Christie projectors with very wide angle lenses to cover the walls and ceiling of the tunnel in three separate bands along the lengh of the space. Each of these arches of light contained a pair of Naim Audio speakers and a pair of vocal microphones at their bases. As the software generated different virtual energy forces that slowly moved down the space, the audience were encouraged to interact with these visuals by releasing their own sonic forces into the room. The resulting audio visual emissions and graphic turbulence created in these vector fields drove a multi channel piece of sound design in Ableton Liveusing OSC and Midi messages. The resulting sound scape sampled, effected and distorted the audience’s utterances and triggered additional lighting effects at each end of the space.

 

SuperEverything* is a cross disciplinary performing arts project, commissioned by the British Council and created by UK leading audio-visual artists The Light Surgeons in collaboration with Malaysian artists. SuperEverything* weaves different documentary narratives to create a poetic audio-visual tapestry, that together form a kaleidoscopic portrait of the diverse cultural landscape of Malaysia. Filmed on location across Peninsular Malaysia, this project sets out to explore the relationship between identity, ritual and place by juxtaposing tradition and modernity to reveal a universal story about who we are and how our complex identities are connected. SuperEverything* brings together a collection of Malaysian musical and visual talent to form a unique audio-visual collaboration. Fusing traditional South East Asian instruments, western classical compositions, field recordings and electronic synthesis and manipulating them live with a stunning, immersive cinematic experience. This land mark piece of live cinema is exploded across multiple projections and layers together stunning documentary footage and motion graphics with a original, live electronic musical score to transport its audiences on a journey through these most universal themes. From our relationships with each other to our relationship with the environment, Super Everything* surveys our everyday rituals to reveal what unites and divides us. It is a journey through Malaysia’s past, to understand its present and to imagine its future. It is a project that aims to elevate it's audience to contemplate our shared human story in order to reveal our collective commonality, and asks a timeless question about who we are as individuals and as a society. Creative Director: Christopher Thomas Allen Leading Artists: Christopher Thomas Allen & Tim Cowie Camera: Christopher Thomas Allen, Tim Cowie, Fauzi Yusoff & Fariz Hanapiah Editing & Post-Production: Christopher Thomas Allen, Tim Cowie, Fauzi Yusoff, Fariz Hanapiah, Jai Rafferty & Helen Omand Production Assistants: Jake Dowling & Simon Bertheux Research Assistant: Annie Kwan Music Direction: Tim Cowie Collaborating Composers: Tim Cowie, Chor Guan Ng & Eu Seng Seto a.k.a DJ Flica Musical Contributors: Hands Percussion & Rhythm in Bronze Live Musical performers (KL): Jimmy Ch'ng, Miu Ng, Ann Peter, May Yong and Ng Chor Guan Sound Engineering: Shugar Studios Music Producer: Hardesh Singh Malaysian Producers: Joanna Lee, Adshrie Yap & Didi Ramlan UK Project Manager: Alice Ceresole Online Content Manager: Matt Armitage Publicity & Marketing Officer: Tan Ee Lyn We would also like to thank the following people for their help and support during the project: Southern Edible Oil Industries (M) Sdn Bhd, Southern Group of Companies, Northport (Malaysia) Bhd, Asia Post Press Sdn Bhd, Hospice Malaysia, PUSAKA – Centre for the Study and Documentation of Traditional Performance in Malaysia, ASWARA – Akademi Seni Budaya & Warisan Kebangsaan , Datin Marion D’Cruz, Joseph Gonzales, Tok Dalang Pak Nasir Yusoff, Kamrul Hussin, Colin Nicholas, Phua Sze Ning, Mike Tee, Reita Rahim, Pn. Maznah Unyan & the Pulau Indah Mah Meri community, Adrian Yeo, Yin Shao Loong, the Tan family, the Lee family, residents of the Sri Sabah flats in Cheras, Thean Hou Temple Petaling Jaya, Batu Caves, (location details of: Tapah orang asli village, Kelantan, Kota Bahru, Muay Thai, Kuala Terengganu, Songket Factory, Keropok Lekor, Eddin Khoo, Khairun Niza Zabidi & Maximilian Conrad, Bernice Chauly, Yap Sau Bin, Lim Kok Yoong, Norhadizah binti Azhar (Fifi), Muhamad Kamalrul bin Azman & his lovely bride, Nur Azah binti Idris and family, Emy Falizal, Ms. Farah of Beautrim Salon, Mr. Amirul of HotHotCut, Mr. Lim, Mr. Pallany & Tuan Haji Zahar of Southern Edible Oil Plantation & Factory, Leow Puay Tin and the Department of Performance & Media Sunway University, Reezal Esa, Harjit Chaal, Syarief Nurlette, Robert Yap, Theresa Tan, Ku Chon Tian, Mathan Kumar Balakrishnan & colleagues at the British Council Kuala Lumpur, Reuben Samuel & Azran Zakry of Mile High Sounds, Sharyn Shufiyan, Rathimalar Govindarajoo, Sivarajah Natarajan & the Sutra Dance family, Jerome Kugan, Pang Khee Teik, Lim Chung Wei, Poon Kai Loon, Khor Seng Chew, Yeoh Heng Lian and Meng of the Pudu Community Art Project, Fahmi Reza, Yante Ismail, Ili Farhana, Hasbeemasputra Abu Bakar, Fairuz and Suzy Sulaiman, Fahmi Fadzil & BLAM, Eugene Low & BombShelter Studios, Raymond Yong a.k.a Yellow Monster. Special thanks to Joel Mills, Emily Wilcox-Sloan, Grey Yeoh and Sunitha Janamohanan at the British Council. Without them, there would be no SuperEverything* www.britishcouncil.com www.lightsurgeons.com Malaysian Artists web links: Visual www.farizhanapiah.tv www.fauziyusoff.com Audio www.myspace.com/flicasound www.ngchorguan.com www.rhythminbronze.com www.hands.com.my http://www.lightsurgeons.com/art/supereverything/

SUPER EVERYTHING*

Commissioning body: British Council Malaysia
Production company: The Light Surgeons

SuperEverything* is a live cinema performance project by The Light Surgeons which explores the relationship between identity, ritual and place through a unique collaborative performing arts project commissioned by the British Council Malaysia and with the support of Canon Malaysia.

The project explores these universal themes using a combination of observational documentary footage, motion graphics, creative programming and original music production to create a poetic audio visual tapestry that forms a rich, kaleidoscopic view of the cultural landscape of Malaysia. The project was filmed on location across Peninsular Malaysia and brings together a collection of Malaysia’s cutting-edge musical and visual artists. Through this process of cultural and artistic cross-collaboration, The Light Surgeons have evolved the project into a new exploded documentary cinema performance in line with their previous works in this arena.

SuperEverything*challenges us to contemplate our shared human story and to ask the timeless question of who we are as individuals and as a society. Through the juxtaposition of tradition and modernity, the project seeks to uncover who we are as human beings and how our complex identities are connected to our every day environments through a multitude of different rituals. It is a journey through Malaysia’s past to understand its present and to reveal a shared social history that looks to our future.

Project Microsite: http://www.supereverything.net/

Solid Steel Radio Mix: https://soundcloud.com/ninja-tune/solid-steel-radio-show-1-3

Creative Director: Christopher Thomas Allen
Leading Artists: Christopher Thomas Allen | Tim Cowie
Camera: Christopher Thomas Allen | Tim Cowie | Fauzi Yusoff | Fariz Hanapiah
Editing & Post-Production: Christopher Thomas Allen | Tim Cowie | Fauzi Yusoff | Fariz Hanapiah | Jai Rafferty | Helen Omand
Production Assistants: Jake Dowling | Simon Bertheux
Research Assistant: Annie Kwan
Music Direction: Tim Cowie
Collaborating Composers: Tim Cowie | Chor Guan Ng | Eu Seng Seto a.k.a DJ Flica
Musical Contributors: Hands Percussion | Rhythm in Bronze
Sound Engineering: Shugar Studios
Music Producer: Hardesh Singh
Malaysian Producers: Joanna Lee | Adshrie Yap | Didi Ramlan
UK Project Manager: Alice Ceresole
Online Content Manager: Matt Armitage