Colony in the Spirit
Description
Cahoots Lab 2023: work-in-progress performance
A solo noise music performance, ‘Colony in the Spirit’ explores the relationship between spiritual technology and colonialism.
What is the role of spiritual technology (repeated cultural practices meant to alter the mind, body or spirit) in the colonial project? What are the ways spiritual technology or other technologies of the self can resist colonialism?
A strong believer in the political potential of noise music and sound collage, Lynden has experimented with a reversal process – instead of starting with a concept and using technology to express it, the process began with technologies, thinking first about performance apparatus and performance body-language, and figuring out how to fit the concept/message into that apparatus.
Lynden loves and enjoys noise music and wants to share it on that basis. That means testing ways to present it to people it is unfamiliar to, in ways that takes care of the listener and the artist, critically examines the cultural features of the form, while still fully being the unique and valuable thing that noise music is.
SUNDAY 16 APRIL | 2:00PM – 3:15PM | COURTYARD STUDIO, CANBERRA THEATRE CENTRE | FREE EVENT, REGISTRATION REQUIRED
LYNDEN BASSETT
I am a composer-performer working across punk and hardcore, noise, sound art, chamber music, and improvisation. I’m always trying to figure out how to do my practice in a way that is safe/inviting/empowering for people who are not hegemonic, and more broadly I’m always trying to figure out how to weave my politics and my work together. I’m still testing the model for noise performance I developed during my time in Cahoots. I’m also undertaking an honours program, using collage-based composition to investigate colonialism.
Lynden was a Cahoots resident in 2021.
Lynden has an interest in how people read the body language/body and how this fits into the broader poetic of the performance, and has been considering a solo performance model since before participating in Cahoots in 2021. Cahoots offered Lynden an opportunity to rethink performance practice, and in Cahoots Lab 2022, Lynden performed an initial iteration of ‘Sacrificial Fascination’. A second iteration of ‘Sacrificial Fascination’ will be performed alongside a recently composed piece.
The performance will take place in the Courtyard Theatre at the Canberra Theatre Centre (Courtyard Theatre is outside of the main complex, down a little alleyway to the left of Canberra Theatre if you are facing the front entrance).
This event will be loud. YAH will supply foam ear plugs. Themes of colonialism and colonial violence, themes of DV, and religious themes, may be audible in some audio samples.
If you have questions or access requirements, please email Ono at operations@youareherecanberra.com.au or call 0450 904 282.
