Robin Fox is a Melbourne based sound and visual artist currently working with live digital media in improvised, composed and installation settings. He creates audio- visual works for the cathode ray oscilloscope, which have been released on the DVD ‘backscatter’ (synaesthesia records). The DVD has screened at the Rotterdam International Film Festival, the Mittwoschule in Berlin, the 8th International New Media Arts Festival in Riga and the TRANSIT festival Switzerland.
Robin Fox is part of constellation in Melbourne.
Live audiovisual performances have taken place across Europe including appearances at the Netmage festival, Bologna, the Wien Modern festival, Vienna, Noise and Glamour Festival, Moscow and the Transacoustic festival, Auckland. This work, in constant development, is currently being realised with a high-powered, audio controlled laser system with recent performances at the Institute for modern Art Brisbane, NIME06 Paris, Wellington International Jazz Festival (NZ), Totally Huge New Music Festival Perth, October Contemporary Festival (Hong Kong).
A major European tour took place in May/June 2007 with laser based presentations at Musique Action Festival (Nancy, France), VENN festival (Bristol, UK), Music Genera Festival (Szczesin, Poland) and Neia Musik Festival (Mulhouse, France) among numerous other appearances. His recent installation work Volta has featured at the RoslynOxley9 and Orange Regional art galleries in 2006 and featured at the Asian Art Biennale in Tapei 2007.
Musically, he has performed with some of the world’s leading improvisers including Jon Rose, Tony Buck, Oren Ambarchi, Lasse Marhaug, Jerome Noetinger, Clayton Thomas (album Substation released by Room40 records 2005), Erkki Veltheim, Natasha Anderson and Sean Baxter among many others and has an ongoing collaborative duo with composer/performer Anthony Pateras. This duo is documented on Coagulate released through synaesthesia in 2003 and Flux Compendium released on eMego in 2006. He is also a member of Beta-erko, a quartet recently released on Berlin based Quecksilber label.
Fox is a regular performer and speaker at Festivals around Australia (What is Music, Liquid Architecture, Electrofringe, SOOB, NowNOW, Big Day Out) and performs regularly across Europe and Asia.
All releases available through Synaesthesia: www.synrecords.com
He also has a PhD in composition, from Monash University focussing on the development of multi-channel performance ecologies and the design of interactive electro-acoustic situations that explore the dynamic between performer, space and computer and an MA in musicology, which documents the historymusic making in Melbourne 1975-9.
Recent appearances include a commissioned performance for the Henie Onstad Kunstcenter Oslo (March 2010), Mois Multi Festival Quebec City (Feb 2010), Steirischer Herbst Festival Graz (Nov 2009), Musica Genera Festival Warsaw (June 2009) and the Yokohama Triennale (September 2008). His audio visual films for the cathode ray oscilloscope are documented on the DVD release ‘backscatter’ (2004) with more recent works Volta and 5 Creation Myths being exhibited as video works at the RoslynOxley9 gallery in Sydney, The Asian Art Biennale in Taipei and the Miniartextil International exhibition in Como Italy.
His groundbreaking work with Chunky Move has contributed to the recent piece Mortal Engine winning a Helpmann award for Best Visual Production and an Honorary mention at the illustrious Prix Ars Electronica. Future projects include a photography exhibition called ‘Proof of Concept’ opening at the Centre for Contemporary Photography in Melbourne July 2010 and a research project with the Bionic Ear Institute composing music for cochlear implant wearers.
About Robin's piece in Constellation.
Melanoma study #1 exists as a framework for improvisation between two performers one playing any keyboard instrument and one playing a classic EWI wind controller. The keyboard part is partially scored, basically to outline a series of pitches and some ways to proceed through those pitches. The Max/MSP patch designed for the wind-controller is accompanied by a custom designed sound file for processing. Combined, these resources provide the EWI player with a vast array of variable sounds and situations. The work is of an indeterminate length and will be almost impossible to reproduce identically from performance to performance.
