Refrakto

10/03/2020Danish Duo Den Sorte Skole Takes Its Mind-Bending Audiovisual Performance/Installation To Church
 

This one here has got us super excited, so bear with us. As part of the upcoming Luminale Biennial for Light Art and Urban Design taking place in Frankfurt this week from March 12th-15th, the acclaimed Danish composer duo and sample wizards Den Sorte Skole will bring their mind-bending audiovisual performance and installation REFRAKTO to the city's St. Katharinenkirche. The show was created exclusively for said venue and in close collaboration with Danish visual artist collective Vertigo as well as local organist Prof. Martin Lücker and promises to be an unforgettable event:

Combining music, sound, light formations and laser mapping, REFRAKTO aims "to create an immersive audiovisual experience" to "investigate different traces of divinity in our history and our sense of a sacred space" and to "explore fundamental questions about the role of religion and unity."

Over the past years, Den Sorte Skole have certainly made a name for themselves with their 'divine' use of countless samples to create entirely new, intricate and impressive tapestries of sound, as demonstrated in iconic projects such as "Ghosts & Robots" or "Indians & Cowboys", constantly challenging our perception, creating mind- and genre-stretching odysseys in sound and parallel worlds, where the past, present and future become one inseparable entity. 

The music for REFRAKTO was "composed from samples of religious and spiritual music recorded through the last seven decades. From field recordings of indigenous tribal ceremonies, Sufi chants and Benedictine choir traditions to classical Arab vocal music and contemporary experimental electronic music." Combine that with the modern visual technology employed by Vertigo and the architectural space of the church and you are bound to witness something unlike anything you have previously experienced. 

"What happens when the context of religious expressions is dissolved? When a Gregorian choir chants with a shaman from Congo in a visually distorted church room? When time and space of the architecture is transformed together with a Hindu poem processed through a vocoder?" The answer awaits you in Frankfurt's St. Katharinen church, where there will be a seated one-hour live experience each night of the Luminale as well as a 15-minute ongoing installation echoing the performance. 

REFRAKTO
March 12 - 15, 2020
19:30 - 20:30 Live Performance (Tickets)
20:30 - 23:00 Installation

Address:
St. Katharinenkirche
An der Hauptwache 1
60313 Frankfurt am Main

AUTHOR: Lev Nordstrom