"2 x 540 khz"
sound installation by mika vainio created in residency at mediaruimte.
6 tube radios, 2 radio transmitters, 2 audio compositions.
»time examined«
publication by raster-noton on mika vainio's work. texts by carl michael von hausswolff, daniela cascella. including 2 audio cds.
a co-production of raster-noton and mediaruimte, lab(au)'s gallery for electronic art.
mika vainio (*1963, helsinki (finland), lives in berlin)
mika vainio is best known as being half of the widely acclaimed electronic music formation "pan sonic". but even though he has exhibited in some of europe’s most important art venues and collaborated with the elite of the contemporary art scene, the rest of his oeuvre is less known. the publication »time examined« by raster-noton, the german label for minimal electronic music, aims to change this with a chronological overview of vainio’s wanderings throughout music, installation, performance and video.
"mika vainio’s work is not so much about structure or formal reductionism per se, as many of his fellow artists and musicians have been doing over the same span of years: rather, it has to do with the aura of structure, with the halo around rhythm, and the effects of sound as it erodes the space — physical and mental — around it, melts within it, hits and scratches it or softly enwraps it." daniela cascella
the book plus two audio cds is the first in a series of publications dedicated to the audio-visual work of artists associated with raster-noton. for the accompanying exhibition, raster-noton and lab[au], the belgian electronic arts trio, joined forces to retrospect mika vainio’s oeuvre; an attempt to make tangible 12 years of artistic creation.
specially for this occasion, mika vainio exhibited a new sound installation, "2 x 540 khz", created in residency at mediaruimte, lab[au]’s gallery for electronic arts in downtown brussels. two looping compositions are sent through radio transmitters and played by several vintage tube radios distributed in the gallery. the soundscape is constituted by a temporal shift and spatial distribution of both compositions.
the exhibition and book launch kicked off with a "2 x 540 kHz" live performance by mika vainio, a combination which traveled afterwards to galleries and happenings across the world.
