T.V. Adamthwaite
Bio and Artistic Statement
Bio
Tyler Adamthwaite is a composer and violinist from Denver, Colorado. He holds a Bachelor of Music from Colorado State University, an MFA from Brandeis University, and is currently working on his PhD studies at the University at Buffalo. His notable mentors include David Felder, David Rakowski, and Erin Gee. As an artist he focuses on the process of decay and generating musical structures which reflect the beauty of imperfect sounds. His ideology stems from his time spent in the woods, admiring natural sounds and environments. He also pays special care to the ideas of hypermediatization and reference in his work. His music can be best described as an “ecosystem” in which each sound has a significance on the soundscape without necessarily being derived from conventional compositional processes. His music is meant to be evocative, generating different “images” or “stories” for each listener based on their personal interpretation of the sounds as interacting entities. While at Brandeis and Buffalo he has had the pleasure of working with many visiting ensembles to explore these ideas. These participating ensembles, and their feedback, has been instrumental in his musical development. These ensembles include Yarn/Wire, Transient Canvas, The Lydian Quartet, Sound Icon, and Mise En. His music has been performed as part of the BEAMS Marathon Weekend, VIPA Festival, and Etchings Festival.
Artistic Statement
We live in an era where information is nearly impossible to avoid. Our minds are bombarded by sounds and images at an alarming pace as we grow closer to becoming a society of watchers. We sit and observe others’ lives through the fiction that they want us to see, in the untarnished lacquer of data. Social networking allows us to express our thoughts – whether they be triumphs or tirades – instantly to others in perfectly curated form. What we see is not the person, but a mediatized representation of them. Every person becomes a story, a collection of thoughts and images; the watcher loses the sense that the observed is real. Yet we as the watchers cannot help but feel impotent in the face of the curated life, the life that gets likes, comments and followers. We long to be perfected images of people, a reflection on the sea of information in which we are adrift. We wish to create a hyperreality of connectedness, a hivemind of idea and emotion, but once one gets a taste of the drug known as digital life, they must seek out higher doses to reach elation. So, we turn to art to fill the void of self-recognition.
Streaming services allow us to satiate our gluttony as consumers of art and entertainment. I can easily look up any image, story, or song if I know of its existence. I do not even need to know the title or name of its creator; search engines can fill in those gaps for me when I can type keywords or themes into my browser-of-choice. I watch, and I reflect myself in what I see. Every character becomes me and in turn I live their success and defeats. This satisfies the need to live in the fictional, digital space that we have enfolded ourselves in. But it still does nothing to satisfy the creative spirit, which craves attention after digesting so many ideas. When one tries to create after binging so much media it often results in an unsatisfying and unsightly regurgitation of the eyes and ears. Still, one has a choice when confronted with the reality of our post-digital lives. One may try and force their way above the surface and thrash as they drown in media, or one might relinquish the idea of the creative genius and accept that creativity comes from coexisting with the flood of ideas.
My art follows the second course of action. Instead of fighting against the digital current, I am letting it sweep me up and swallow me. I am coexisting with the information overload as I wrap around the ideas of those that have come before me. Instead of abolishing reference from my work, I am actively trying to incorporate it. I am letting it explode into something new. I am using the referent like clay and shaping it into something entirely foreign from the intentions of the original creator. I am using their ideas as a tether to ground myself in tradition, while simultaneously attempting to create something non-traditional. It is my goal that, by the end of the process, the other’s ideas are completely unrecognizable. The ideas of the past are left like a discarded vehicle in a ditch; one may be able to tell that it was a sedan, truck, or sports utility vehicle, but it is so rusted and eaten away that its finer details (make, model, color, etc.) are not perceivable.
It is not only the carcass of the original that is altered by this idea of decay, but everything around it is also changed. Going back to the example of the vehicle in the ditch: everything around it will grow and retake it. Trees will sprout and pierce through the carapace, weeds will grow beneath it, even animals may choose to make it into a home. The decaying car becomes part of nature just as much as it is not an aspect of the original landscape. Interrelationships produce beauty, decay allows for life, reference leaves fertile soil for new ideas to flourish. It is my goal to take the breath of what is already in existence and impart my own breath onto, around and through it to give it new life. To that end, I will seek to use structures from the natural and the human to synthesize new artistic ideas which can take on a life of their own. I will create art that lies in the liminal space between the digital and the natural and confound the listener with no distinction between the two. This friction will allow for new art to flourish in a situation that is oversaturated with information.
Streaming services allow us to satiate our gluttony as consumers of art and entertainment. I can easily look up any image, story, or song if I know of its existence. I do not even need to know the title or name of its creator; search engines can fill in those gaps for me when I can type keywords or themes into my browser-of-choice. I watch, and I reflect myself in what I see. Every character becomes me and in turn I live their success and defeats. This satisfies the need to live in the fictional, digital space that we have enfolded ourselves in. But it still does nothing to satisfy the creative spirit, which craves attention after digesting so many ideas. When one tries to create after binging so much media it often results in an unsatisfying and unsightly regurgitation of the eyes and ears. Still, one has a choice when confronted with the reality of our post-digital lives. One may try and force their way above the surface and thrash as they drown in media, or one might relinquish the idea of the creative genius and accept that creativity comes from coexisting with the flood of ideas.
My art follows the second course of action. Instead of fighting against the digital current, I am letting it sweep me up and swallow me. I am coexisting with the information overload as I wrap around the ideas of those that have come before me. Instead of abolishing reference from my work, I am actively trying to incorporate it. I am letting it explode into something new. I am using the referent like clay and shaping it into something entirely foreign from the intentions of the original creator. I am using their ideas as a tether to ground myself in tradition, while simultaneously attempting to create something non-traditional. It is my goal that, by the end of the process, the other’s ideas are completely unrecognizable. The ideas of the past are left like a discarded vehicle in a ditch; one may be able to tell that it was a sedan, truck, or sports utility vehicle, but it is so rusted and eaten away that its finer details (make, model, color, etc.) are not perceivable.
It is not only the carcass of the original that is altered by this idea of decay, but everything around it is also changed. Going back to the example of the vehicle in the ditch: everything around it will grow and retake it. Trees will sprout and pierce through the carapace, weeds will grow beneath it, even animals may choose to make it into a home. The decaying car becomes part of nature just as much as it is not an aspect of the original landscape. Interrelationships produce beauty, decay allows for life, reference leaves fertile soil for new ideas to flourish. It is my goal to take the breath of what is already in existence and impart my own breath onto, around and through it to give it new life. To that end, I will seek to use structures from the natural and the human to synthesize new artistic ideas which can take on a life of their own. I will create art that lies in the liminal space between the digital and the natural and confound the listener with no distinction between the two. This friction will allow for new art to flourish in a situation that is oversaturated with information.