Jacopo Mazzonelli e Matteo Franceschini aka Tovel
The Act of TouchGiardino Giusti
Performance 30 May 2019
In occasione della XIV edizione di Verona Risuona - riconversione sonora di spazi urbani - festival diffuso dedicato alle contaminazioni tra arte e musica, organizzato dall'Accademia di Belle Arti, il Conservatorio di Verona e l’Accademia di Musica e Teatro di Göteborg - giovedì 30 maggio alle ore 21.00 il Giardino Giusti ospita la performance The Act of Touch di Jacopo Mazzonelli e Tovel (aka Matteo Franceschini - Leone d'argento alla Biennale di Musica di Venezia 2019). L'iniziativa è proposta da Spazio Cordis per il ciclo Ectopie e sostenuta da AGIVERONA Associazione Culturale e Lorenzo Lomonaco con la courtesy di Paolo Maria Deanesi Gallery (Trento), Galleria Giovanni Bonelli (Milano - Pietrasanta) e Collezione privata Verona.
Le opere di Jacopo Mazzonelli [ABCDEFG, 2015-2016, pianoforti verticali assemblati, dim. variabili] sono parte di Collezione privata Verona, che le concede in gentile prestito agli esecutori, e resteranno in esposizione nelle sale dell’Appartamento 900 del Giardino Giusti dal 02 al 30 giugno 2019 per la mostra HIDDEN SOUND ROOMS (ingresso soggetto a pagamento di biglietto d’accesso al Giardino Giusti). Il pianoforte è senza dubbio lo strumento che più rappresenta la fioritura della cultura musicale occidentale dal tardo Settecento a oggi. In questo senso, la performance musicale The Act of Touch, costruita sull’opera ABCDEFG di Jacopo Mazzonelli, permette un cammino a ritroso, una sorta di regresso
all’essenziale, un percorso di “purificazione” creativa votata a catturare l’immagine più profonda di ciò che si sta scrivendo: la materia, i tasti bianchi, le sette note, l’alternanza rigo/spazio del pentagramma. The Act of Touch getta lo spettatore all’interno di un paesaggio sonoro inatteso, dove il suono organizzato si palesa dopo un complesso itinerario di esplorazione dei materiali. Ordinata su più livelli visivi e concettuali, la performance si configura come una graduale e consapevole scoperta d‘identità - un percorso di conoscenza e sviluppo che l’impiego dei sette pianoforti/scultura modificati permette di compiere. La collaborazione tra Matteo Franceschini e Jacopo Mazzonelli si realizza attraverso una performance dove la scrittura acustica
si fonde con la manipolazione elettronica in tempo reale. La nuova fisionomia dei pianoforti e la trasformazione dei suoi materiali si configura come il punto di partenza per una riflessione sulla natura stessa del rapporto tra suono e materia. La performance è stata presentata per la prima volta in occasione della personale di Jacopo Mazzonelli To be played at maximum volume presso il MART / Galleria Civica di Trento (una mostra a cura di Luigi Fassi e Margherita de Pilati). La partitura è pubblicata da Casa Ricordi. Dopo ulteriori prestigiose rappresentazioni, The Act of Touch approda al Giardino Giusti.
The piano is without doubt the instrument which best represents the blooming of the Western musical culture from the late eighteenth century until today. Considering that, the musical performance The Act of Touchbuilt upon Jacopo Mazzonelli’s ABCDEFGartwork allows to walk backwards, a sort of regression to the essential, a process of creative “purification” meant to capture the deepest image of what one is writing: the matter, the white keys on the board, the seven notes, the alternation of staff/space on the pitch. The Act of Touch throws the spectator into an unexpected soundscape, where the organized sound is revealed after a complex itinerary of the exploration of materials. Structured on multiple visual and conceptual levels, the performance becomes a progressive and conscious discovery of one’s identity – a process of knowledge and development granted by the altered pianos. The collaboration between Matteo Franceschini and Jacopo Mazzonelli materializes through a performance in which the acoustic writing melts with the electronic manipulation in real time. The pianos’ new physiognomy and the transformation of its materials becomes the point of departure for a reflection upon the very nature of the sound–matter relation. In The Act of Touch, each of the seven devices is individually amplified and arranged according to a precise sequence where the central note of the diatonic scale (FA) assumes a key role in the development of the musical discourse. The pianos are placed in a specular manner for each of the two performers, while the sounding board of the note FA - at the centre of the scene - is oriented directly towards the audience. The performers' hands explore the resonances through the use of a series of ancient tuning forks tuned by semitones Through a group of sensors that detects and analyses the vibrations of wooden material by transforming them into new timbres, the performers activate a virtuosic technical game. A multi-channel lighting control system transforms each scene into a visual framework, gradually focusing attention on precise expressive details. The radical choice of using only materials, shapes and sounds, deriving from the seven pianos, amplifies and at the same time closes the circle around a project to which Franceschini and Mazzonelli have worked over the last three years, from the choice of materials to the construction of the instruments, through the archiving and subsequent re-elaboration of each sound encountered during the transformation process. Wishing to extend the borders of the sonorous and conceptual communication, the traditionally confined composer role combines here with the interpreter’s.
With the pseudonymTOVEL, Matteo Franceschini relaunches the figure of the author/performer with the aim of experiencing a new sound "from the inside"; the direct involvement as a performer and the inevitable work in close contact with the musicians presents itself as a true creative act. The point of departure of Jacopo Mazzonelli's visual creation is musical parallelism, time and its rhythm, the becoming and the passing, the historicity and the memory. The artist's quest avails itself of several techniques, of methods borrowed from different languages and different branches, and of observations which come from unexpected angles that allow going beyond a front interpretation of the artwork. The "musical gesture", meant as what underlies the traditional performance, is at the center of his interest. By working on the interpretation and visualization of the dimension of sound, the artist confronts himself with instruments that he destructures, transforms and recomposes. Mazzonelli and Franceschini have been working together since 2017, the year of the first performance of ABCDEFG [a Tuned Scuplture] performed at the MART / Civic Gallery of Trento during the opening of the monographic exhibition To Be Played at Maximum Volume by Jacopo Mazzonelli and curated by Luigi Fassi and Margherita de Pilati. In 2018, the same performance was staged in the occasion of Artcity Bologna at the International Museum and Library of Music in Bologna, in conjunction with the personal exhibition Sonografia curated by Chiara Ianeselli. Also in 2018, after an intense work of research and remodelling of the project, the performance was expanded assuming the current title The Act of Touch and was presented for the first time at the GAMO Festival at Le Murate PAC in Florence.In 2019, the Atelier space of the Elfo Puccini Theater in Milan hosts the bi- personal exhibition Parallax, where the Heptagon multi-channel audio installation [developed from the sound materials used for the performance of The Act of Touch] by Matteo Franceschini is exhibited alongside the artwork ABCDEFGby Jacopo Mazzonelli. The musical score is published by Casa Ricordi. The performance is a project by TOVEL [Matteo Franceschini] and Jacopo Mazzonelli, who together with the pianist Eleonora Wegher are also direct performers. The works of Jacopo Mazzonelli [ABCDEFG, 2015-16, assembled vertical pianos, dim. variables] are part of a private collection and are kindly granted to the executors.
Le opere di Jacopo Mazzonelli [ABCDEFG, 2015-2016, pianoforti verticali assemblati, dim. variabili] sono parte di Collezione privata Verona, che le concede in gentile prestito agli esecutori, e resteranno in esposizione nelle sale dell’Appartamento 900 del Giardino Giusti dal 02 al 30 giugno 2019 per la mostra HIDDEN SOUND ROOMS (ingresso soggetto a pagamento di biglietto d’accesso al Giardino Giusti). Il pianoforte è senza dubbio lo strumento che più rappresenta la fioritura della cultura musicale occidentale dal tardo Settecento a oggi. In questo senso, la performance musicale The Act of Touch, costruita sull’opera ABCDEFG di Jacopo Mazzonelli, permette un cammino a ritroso, una sorta di regresso
all’essenziale, un percorso di “purificazione” creativa votata a catturare l’immagine più profonda di ciò che si sta scrivendo: la materia, i tasti bianchi, le sette note, l’alternanza rigo/spazio del pentagramma. The Act of Touch getta lo spettatore all’interno di un paesaggio sonoro inatteso, dove il suono organizzato si palesa dopo un complesso itinerario di esplorazione dei materiali. Ordinata su più livelli visivi e concettuali, la performance si configura come una graduale e consapevole scoperta d‘identità - un percorso di conoscenza e sviluppo che l’impiego dei sette pianoforti/scultura modificati permette di compiere. La collaborazione tra Matteo Franceschini e Jacopo Mazzonelli si realizza attraverso una performance dove la scrittura acustica
si fonde con la manipolazione elettronica in tempo reale. La nuova fisionomia dei pianoforti e la trasformazione dei suoi materiali si configura come il punto di partenza per una riflessione sulla natura stessa del rapporto tra suono e materia. La performance è stata presentata per la prima volta in occasione della personale di Jacopo Mazzonelli To be played at maximum volume presso il MART / Galleria Civica di Trento (una mostra a cura di Luigi Fassi e Margherita de Pilati). La partitura è pubblicata da Casa Ricordi. Dopo ulteriori prestigiose rappresentazioni, The Act of Touch approda al Giardino Giusti.
The piano is without doubt the instrument which best represents the blooming of the Western musical culture from the late eighteenth century until today. Considering that, the musical performance The Act of Touchbuilt upon Jacopo Mazzonelli’s ABCDEFGartwork allows to walk backwards, a sort of regression to the essential, a process of creative “purification” meant to capture the deepest image of what one is writing: the matter, the white keys on the board, the seven notes, the alternation of staff/space on the pitch. The Act of Touch throws the spectator into an unexpected soundscape, where the organized sound is revealed after a complex itinerary of the exploration of materials. Structured on multiple visual and conceptual levels, the performance becomes a progressive and conscious discovery of one’s identity – a process of knowledge and development granted by the altered pianos. The collaboration between Matteo Franceschini and Jacopo Mazzonelli materializes through a performance in which the acoustic writing melts with the electronic manipulation in real time. The pianos’ new physiognomy and the transformation of its materials becomes the point of departure for a reflection upon the very nature of the sound–matter relation. In The Act of Touch, each of the seven devices is individually amplified and arranged according to a precise sequence where the central note of the diatonic scale (FA) assumes a key role in the development of the musical discourse. The pianos are placed in a specular manner for each of the two performers, while the sounding board of the note FA - at the centre of the scene - is oriented directly towards the audience. The performers' hands explore the resonances through the use of a series of ancient tuning forks tuned by semitones Through a group of sensors that detects and analyses the vibrations of wooden material by transforming them into new timbres, the performers activate a virtuosic technical game. A multi-channel lighting control system transforms each scene into a visual framework, gradually focusing attention on precise expressive details. The radical choice of using only materials, shapes and sounds, deriving from the seven pianos, amplifies and at the same time closes the circle around a project to which Franceschini and Mazzonelli have worked over the last three years, from the choice of materials to the construction of the instruments, through the archiving and subsequent re-elaboration of each sound encountered during the transformation process. Wishing to extend the borders of the sonorous and conceptual communication, the traditionally confined composer role combines here with the interpreter’s.
With the pseudonymTOVEL, Matteo Franceschini relaunches the figure of the author/performer with the aim of experiencing a new sound "from the inside"; the direct involvement as a performer and the inevitable work in close contact with the musicians presents itself as a true creative act. The point of departure of Jacopo Mazzonelli's visual creation is musical parallelism, time and its rhythm, the becoming and the passing, the historicity and the memory. The artist's quest avails itself of several techniques, of methods borrowed from different languages and different branches, and of observations which come from unexpected angles that allow going beyond a front interpretation of the artwork. The "musical gesture", meant as what underlies the traditional performance, is at the center of his interest. By working on the interpretation and visualization of the dimension of sound, the artist confronts himself with instruments that he destructures, transforms and recomposes. Mazzonelli and Franceschini have been working together since 2017, the year of the first performance of ABCDEFG [a Tuned Scuplture] performed at the MART / Civic Gallery of Trento during the opening of the monographic exhibition To Be Played at Maximum Volume by Jacopo Mazzonelli and curated by Luigi Fassi and Margherita de Pilati. In 2018, the same performance was staged in the occasion of Artcity Bologna at the International Museum and Library of Music in Bologna, in conjunction with the personal exhibition Sonografia curated by Chiara Ianeselli. Also in 2018, after an intense work of research and remodelling of the project, the performance was expanded assuming the current title The Act of Touch and was presented for the first time at the GAMO Festival at Le Murate PAC in Florence.In 2019, the Atelier space of the Elfo Puccini Theater in Milan hosts the bi- personal exhibition Parallax, where the Heptagon multi-channel audio installation [developed from the sound materials used for the performance of The Act of Touch] by Matteo Franceschini is exhibited alongside the artwork ABCDEFGby Jacopo Mazzonelli. The musical score is published by Casa Ricordi. The performance is a project by TOVEL [Matteo Franceschini] and Jacopo Mazzonelli, who together with the pianist Eleonora Wegher are also direct performers. The works of Jacopo Mazzonelli [ABCDEFG, 2015-16, assembled vertical pianos, dim. variables] are part of a private collection and are kindly granted to the executors.
