Introduction

DARK MATTER explores the interconnectedness and transmission of human knowledge. It incorporates understandings of human consciousness and perception drawn from Hindu metaphysics, Renaissance `hermetic´ thought to more recent developments within the realm of physics. Its imaginary `narrative´ is formed within the listener/viewer as they move through multiple spaces and acoustic environments creating their own pathway through a labyrinth of real (acoustic and/or electronic) sound-sources. The location of a moving `body´ (performer, audience) within `space´ is central to the manipulation of sound and physical elements.

In 2001 the Brisbane Powerhouse theatre in Brisbane was transformed into multiple spaces: one relatively large area in the centre, in front of the main stage, where all activities were audible and more or less visible, and other spaces delimited by installation elements, which had spatial and acoustic qualities of their own.

Six of the performers (conductor, electric guitar, clarinet, vocalist and sound artist) worked from specially-built constructions. These included a tower of glass and steel for the vocalist, various rostra of cut glass, steel and suspended-light constructions and composite placements of pre-made works.

Central to Per Inge BJØRLO's work is an engagement with the expressive properties of physical materials, and with working on them in such a way as to encapsulate the energies and processes involved in creating their eventual forms. The power of his work is contained as much in the traces and scars left by the production process as in the product itself. There is a direct parallel here with Richard BARRETT's engagement in the physicality of instruments and performance. The forceful presence of the material, in both raw and sophisticatedly worked forms, is a prime characteristic of the work of both artists.

Bjørlo's use of distorted metal forms, bubbled up out of convex and concave discs, metallic grids, cones, perspex shields, rods and suspensions, all suggest a certain dynamic for intrusion and intervention shared by both artists. Barrett's concept of `radical instrumental writing´ proceeds from the apprehension of the instrument/player combination, of trying to `sculpt´ musical material away to discover a existent but unexplored compositional possibility. Historical practice is borne in mind as a special case of possible instrumentalisms, and because `practice material´ is used to provides a kind of scale of familiarity versus awkwardness. This is not dissimilar to Bjørlo's approach to establishing the form of his structures.