64 Refractions: Nekyia

Joseph Hyde


These audiovisual fragments are distortions and dislocations of texts by Alaric Sumner. The voices that can be heard are those of Alaric Sumner and Trina Furre.

The work was commissioned for 'On Line', the latest issue of 'Performance Research' (publ. Routledge).

Most of the material contained in the fragments (including the texts) derives from 'Nekyia', a collaborative work by Alaric Sumner and Joseph Hyde.

'Nekyia', for speaker, singer, electroacoustic sound and video, is a recital for the eyes and ears. It is built from language and the visual and sonic traces of language. Text is sung and spoken within an electroacoustic environment built from fragmented language and complemented and interrupted by video. Nekyia is a term used by Jung (taken from Homer and Virgil), and refers to a night sea journey and a descent into hell to confront the dead or inner terrors. Sumner's text is a tapestry of fragmented quotation, further fragmented by Hyde's recorded voicescape and electronic interjections.

For more information, see http://www.dartington.ac.uk/~j.hyde