[ISEA95] Artist Statement: Bentley Jarvis — Last Night: Is Winter Really Over?

Artist Statement

The French writer Marcel Proust had an extremely acute sense of smell. Detailed, poignant descriptions of fragrances are frequent throughout his series of novels “Remembrance of Things Past”. I am extracting Proust’s olfactory descriptions from his novels and working them into an audio installation. All of the acoustic material in the installation are derived from French and English texts read by a woman and a man. At times, the texts are absolutely clear and intelligible. At other times, the text is transformed electronically to produce sweeping, slowly evolving gestures, in the relaxed style of Proust’s prose. The electronic transformation of the text is done using “Wave” signal processing software.

  • Bentley Jarvis, Canada. Born in Red Lake, Ontario in 1949,  he teaches electronic music at the Ontario College of Art in Toronto. His music has been heard in concert and on radio throughout North America and Europe.