Sex, Lynch And Video Gamesis a difficult work to explain.
For a start, it’s not even technically a ‘work’: it’s works, plural – three of them, comprising separate productions conceived by the celebrated artist, musician and classical composer Nicole Lizée. “Two of the pieces were written in 2016,” Lizée explains. “Both8-Bit UrbexandLynchÉtudes. The third piece isKarappo Okesutura, a karaoke-based project that was begun in 2006 withVolume 1. The concert featuresVolume 2and I’m about to start work onVolume 3.”
Still with us? Good, because there’s more: though each section contains a strong musical element, it would be wrong to describeSex, Lynch And Video Gamesas a concert, per se. The show is set to heavily involve projection and video work, and the central piece,Lynch Études, draws strongly on the work of film director David Lynch.
For Lizée, Lynch is one of the premier artists of our time. The genre-breaking surrealist – a creative force responsible for such films asBlue VelvetandWild At Heartand the cult TV showTwin Peaks– has long fascinated her.
“Lynch is an innovator – he has a completely idiosyncratic style and vision,” she says. “He is an inventor of worlds, languages, film styles, form, and even genres. His characters fromTwin Peaks, for example, are cultural touchstones for many people. They are manifestations of Lynch’s dream worlds, and I think people remember them because they are familiar to them in a way that they can’t quite explain. We all dream and have these vague recollections of the astral plane. Lynch is speaking to us via our ephemeral connection to our dream states.”
Not that those attending Lizée’s performance need a working knowledge of Lynch and his films, mind you. “Sometimes audiences won’t really know the references,” she says. “On several occasions I have had audience members approach me saying they have never seen a Lynch film, or only certain Lynch films, but were moved by the piece, and now fully intend to watch the films. This is all very interesting to me. I sometimes look at it as if I were a scientist. After the piece is finished I am curious to see how the performers and audience are going to interact and react to something that’s been living in my head for so long.”
Of course, that reaction often involves mild confusion. But Lizée isn’t innocent about the sometimes confrontational nature of her work – she has spent her career sending punters and critics stumbling away from her shows scratching their heads, and has grown used to the response of those thrown or a little lost.
“During a performance in England of my piece, [2013’s]Hitchcock Études, I was told that there was a heated argument among the faculty immediately following the performance, during ‘feedback’ time. One faculty member felt that [it] wasn’t music and that art should be beautiful, not frightening, whereas others spoke for its innovation and inventive ways of expression and marrying new music and images, positing that this is the future.”
Certainly, there is something deeply forward-thinking about8-Bit Urbex, one ofSex, Lynch And Video Games’ other components. The work was born from Lizée’s decade-long obsession with video games, and utilises a range of nostalgic devices in order to create a vision of retro-futurism that is truly unique.
“I have a very long history with video games, ever since my father came home one day in the late 1970s with the Atari 2600 home console and two game cartridges. I was hooked. I played the games on those two cartridges constantly. The sounds and visuals became permanently implanted in my brain. And when the console would start to glitch, as analogue devices were prone to do, it became even more compelling.”
The manipulation of niche devices and gadgets also plays a large part inKarappo Okesutura, providing a nice link between sections and allowing audiences to walk away fromSex, Lynch And Video Gamesfeeling satisfied they have witnessed a complete, finished performance – however strange the performance in question might have been.Karappo Okesuturawas also born both from Lizeé’s obsessive collecting of gizmos and her bizarre interest areas, and though it has its roots in Japanese culture and karaoke, those recognisable touchstones are filtered through her distinct world view.
“In 2005 I started collecting karaoke tapes. I was drawn to the sounds that jump to the forefront once the main identifiers for a song, the melody and lyrics, are removed – you’re left with the background vocals, basslines, handclaps and everything that exists primarily to support the main melody. Once that’s extracted it becomes a whole new experience. Some songs sound completely eerie when that lead vocal is taken out. There are moments in certain karaoke songs that are nearly dead silent excerpt for the ‘oohs’ and ‘ahhs’, or some reverberating handclaps.”
So there you are: the three lopsided, lunatic parts to a striking machine. But Lizeé is at pains to stress that despite how odd and overwhelming it all might sound,Sex, Lynch And Video Gamesis designed to be a lot of fun. “Audience members have told me how they fluctuate through emotions – humour, giddiness, fear, surprise, nostalgia, sadness, shock, terror – this is all great,” she says. “Because I go through these emotions when creating it too.”
[Sex, Lynch And Video Games photo by Murray Lightburn]
Sex, Lynch And Video Games with The Australian Art Orchestra takes placeThursday January 19 atCity Recital Hall, as part of Sydney Festival 2017.
