Stephan Crasneanscki and Patti Smith at Stephan’s studio in NYC. Photo by Satya Crasneanscki
Soundwalk Collective & Patti Smith
EVIDENCE
2022
Between 2017 and 2021, Stephan Crasneanscki and Patti Smith collaborated on the creation of Perfect Vision: a triptych of albums which take their inspiration from the writings of three emblematic French poets: Antonin Artaud, Arthur Rimbaud and René Daumal. Central to the work was the poets’ necessity to travel to different lands to acquire a new vision and perspective on themselves and their art.
Recorded in the Sierra Tarahumara of Mexico, the Abyssinian valley of Ethiopia, and the Himalayan Summit of India respectively, the core idea is that each landscape holds sleeping memories that are the witness of human passage. Produced with Russell Elevado, Leonardo Heiblum, Nicolas Becker and Soundwalk Collective’s Simone Merli, each album retraces the poets’ footsteps, channelled through on-location recorded soundscapes and musicalities, in search of hidden, earthy sounds that hold embedded existence, with Patti Smith revisiting the poets’ words that have been inspired by the landscapes. The result is a sound and visual montage that traverses the works of Rimbaud, Artaud and Daumal in their voyage to elsewhere.
Stimulated by these metaphysical journeys, the musical and sound composition of Perfect Vision is the starting point for this new site-specific and multidisciplinary exhibition that Soundwalk Collective and Patti Smith have conceived for the Centre Pompidou.
Evidence is a poetic and immersive quest, an ode to a world without borders, a contemporary reflection on the infinite and the universal, a spiritual quest for oneness as a living and life-giving presence.
The physical, sound and visual journeys of Soundwalk Collective enter into a conversation with the poetic trajectories of Patti Smith, to create a new vision and language. The exhibition space presents sound, film, abstract imagery, objects and found art collected from their travels, leading the visitor towards a large investigative installation that juxtaposes photography, text and original artwork by Patti Smith, from both her personal collections as well as those of Musée national d’art moderne and MoMA, as an evidence of the existence of these poets and their inspiration, offering a true immersion in their thought and art.
Director: Laura Poitras
Editors: Amy Foote, Joe Bini, Brian A. Kates, A.C.E.
Executive Producers: Jeff Skoll, Diane Weyermann, Clare Carter, Alex Kwartler, Hayley Theisen
Producers: Howard Gertler, John Lyons, Nan Goldin, Yoni Golijov, Laura Poitras
Photography & Slideshows: Nan Goldin
Music Supervisor: Dawn Sutter Madell
Music: Soundwalk Collective
Co-Producer: Megan Kapler
Archival Producer: Shanti Avirgan
Archival Co-Producer: Olivia Streisand
Featured Vocalists: Fanny Mulay Winter, Holan Gultom, Sidney Kwadjo Frenz, Youka Snell
Words And Texts: Friedrich Hölderlin
String Sessions: Anthea Caddy, Davis West, Lucas Sanchez, Lucy Railton, Marie Langlamet, Wolf Hassinger, Youka Snell
Conducting And Arranging For String Quartet: Zacharias Falkenberg
Arranging For Orchestra: Johannes Malfatti
Additional Arrangements: Aurelien Rivière
Musicians Casting: Dhanesh Jayaselan
Recording Engineer: Erik Breuer
Studio Assistants: Heinrich Matis, Rhea Sodemann, Robert Henriques
Recorded At: Analogue Foundation Berlin
www.soundwalkcollective.com
www.analoguefoundation.com
SOUNDWALK COLLECTIVE
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