THE Crawford Gallery in Cork has participated in this year's Intermedia festival by housing an installation by Una Walker and Paul Brown. The underlying theme of the work - the third in a series - is the use of communications in time of war. The central elements are images printed onto acetate and hand-made paper by Walker, and a 45-minute sound work by Brown, entitled Extracts From The Golden Treasury Of Knowledge On The Art Of Making War, Part 3: Language And Silence.
The compatibility of the collaboration is a little uncertain since the use of sound is clearly referential, and in sections, purely melodic, moving, through conventionally crafted musical phrases characterised by a brassy synth sound. The visuals on the other hand are sparse and encoded with tenuous links between language, sign and symbol.
However, this is not to imply the sound is merely Muzak accompaniment to the visuals, since sections of the tape-recording offer contextual support in the form of radio discussion or reference to militaristic communication. Furthermore, it has a structural, function as a quadraphonic sound split sends a helicopter around the room making interesting use of the available space.
The visual aspect revolves around three arrangements suspended from the ceiling. These are made from A4 acetate sheets spliced together to form transparent curtains. On these, are copied images of atomic bombs, specifications/ directives for identifying and destroying second World War aircraft, as well as cannons and fortresses. The third hanging also uses acetate, but the white backing is still attached, and sandwiched between each is a printed image of an aircraft. These vertical structures are balanced by a sequence of small squares made from newspaper pulp which run around the perimeter of the space, each printed with silver grey dots and dashes from the Morse code.
