Rebelião das nuvens
“When the Carnation Revolution of April 25th, 1974 occurred, the Portuguese region of Lafões entered a cultural effervescence, visible in the celebratory spirit of the people’s social manifestations. Gregório Silvestre, a Portuguese migrant returning to his homeland after years in Brazil, felt the need to record those moments that took place in his mountainous land, and armed with a cassette recorder he managed to capture festivities, conversations and some profound reflections about his people.
This sonic essay attempts to re-imagine the figure of Gregório Silvestre from his personal archival collection. There is an idea of reconstructing a territory through the “lens” of an unknown and physically distant character. And I think that here, something of the methodology that Steve Feld implements in his theories on acoustemology appears, and it is this idea of “listening to the stories of listening”. That is to say, to listen to what others in their local context listen to and to make a kind of biography of listening.
This work attempts to approach Binaural Nodar’s digital repository, product of more than 20 years of artistic residencies in rural areas of deep Portugal, mixing it with personal and external recordings, from various listeners and field recording enthusiasts. Sounds of the carnival of Lazarim, drums, bells, crowds, young kids getting into the Paiva river, passing carts and flowing rivers, all mixed with Brazilian blocos rhythms and other deformed, glitched and unclear fragments. The festive and carnivalesque sound accompanies the first part of the journey. Gregório’s speech, “conversa sobre os melhoramentos no lugar de vilarinho do monte (1979)”, articulates the whole piece, proposing reflections on popular festivities and the importance of their preservation. Although Gregório Silvesttre recorded this manifesto in solitude, there is an intention to bring his voice back into the public space.
Rebelião das nuvens wonders why people feel the need to record: does what is not recorded not exist? The need to capture the world around us hides an aura of fear of death, of the finitude of the human being. There is an extreme confidence in the devices in their role of recording reality. Now, what happens if machines decide to erase the archives of the world or mix them up as they please? Let’s think of a machine that analyses the archives and generates random relationships, that converses with the materials generated by humanity and produces its own memories. Well, it already exists, so why trust in machines?”
Luciano Piccilli, September 2024
Luciano Piccilli (Argentina) is an image and sound designer (UBA) born in Misiones, Argentina in 1991. He completed postgraduate studies in Expanded Music (UNSAM) and Sound Art (UNTREF). He received the 1st Prize “Installations and Alternative Media” at the 3rd UBA Design Biennial. He participated in exhibitions in Argentina, Colombia, Peru, United States and Spain. His sound work has been programmed by Proyecto Tanque, Site Specific Songs (Arg), the Ruido / Noise gallery in Austin Texas, the “First Look” festival in Los Angeles, California and the “Water of Change” Digital Archive in India. In 2022 he participated in the International Festival of Sound and Interactive Art INSONORA, held in the city of Madrid.