● Extract from the video [0:48]

The video image appears in the circular cutting out of the sculpture.

Niels Plenge 2019, digatal video, 18 min

● War Flowers (Damaskus) – Instrument version

Object with video for installation.

The video was developed from two different sources. The sound is sampled from the war in Syria where government troopers film with GoPro cameras from inside their tanks while they shoot a housing area asunder. These recordings I found on the internet. First I deleted all human voices. Then the remaining engine sounds and artillery salvoes were processed with fragmentation filters and ring modulators to unrecognizability.

The images of the video doesn’t show how the original sounds were produced or altered but is instead graphical representations of the resulting sound curves. Spectrographic and kaleidoscopic effects create an abstraction far beyond the extreme origin. Flowerlike formations resembling Middle Eastern ornamentation or arabesques fluctuate back and forth in accordance with the sound.

The video screen is installed in the resonance chamber of the idle instrument while powerful loudspeakers make sure that the sound waves are perceptible. Thus the work accentuates the gravity and violence of war as opposed to artworks that often end up as harmless ornamentation and strive for beauty.

War Flowers - Instrument Version is part of the work String Quartet. Go to page.

Niels Plenge 2019, video sculpture