Matthew Olden and I were invited by In Between Time to create a live performative response to Helen Cole and Alex Bradley’s Sound and Light installation We Are Warriors in the stunning setting of Redcliffe Caves, Bristol.

We Are Warriors is a sound and light installation in Bristol’s historic Redcliffe Caves, a Medieval network of caverns and catacombs sprawling beneath the city. Thousands of flickering lights are nestled into the sloping, red sandstone walls, while a soundscape of breaths, words, chants and song reverberates in the space.  A beacon calling you in, We Are Warriors is made up of the voices of 130 Bristolian women and girls, aged 8-80, holding space for the experiences of women and people everywhere. “A reclamation of a city’s darkest spaces, for all those whose voice has ever been silenced.”

Matthew and I responded to the installation with a two hour octophonic sound performance. We improvised with recordings of hidden sounds from the surrounding area, starting deep underground and in the depths of the harbour, through the natural whispers of the river surfaces, from inside trees, to the usually inaudible soundscapes of bats and ethereal broadcasts of the stratosphere woven together with the voices from We Are Warriors, and sounds created from synthesisers.

I was particularly excited to try out my new magnetic pendulum instruments which I started on a residency at iii in The Hague and have been working on it since then as part of my Arts Council DYCP development grant. The 3 pendulums work with the push and pull of magnetic fields. There are some fixed magnets and some electromagnetic coils that I control the strength and polarity of live. Each pendulum has an adjustable LED on the end, which swings over an array of Light Sensors. By moving the pendulum by switching the polarity and strength of magnetic coils and changing the brightness of the LED, i was able to use the light sensors to manipulate sounds from field recordings to synthesisers.

The pendulums also form a kinetic light sculpture, which complimented the tiny twinkling lights of the “We Are Warriors” installation setting. I also set up a new version of ‘balancing jars’ which are based on my installation Tipping Point, and a more recent iteration as a set of manual instruments for ‘acts of balancing and unbalancing‘ for QME. These balancing jars work with water levels and feedback, as the water levels change, the feedback is tuned to different pitches.

A short extract of the pendulums in action and some photos below.