A Singe Breath by Darren O'Brien

Operating at the intersection of fine art walking practice, psychogeography, critical animal studies and ecology, the practice of Deep Canine Topography seeks to reframe the humble act of the ‘walkies’ as a co-authored act of ‘making’ or ‘performing’ together. As part of the practice based element of my PhD thesis, Deep Canine Topography, this 11 min video and musical composition is built around series of urban walks and utilises rhythms and repetition of breathing, walking, traffic and more than human encounters, including chance encounters with winged beasts. It explores the rhythms of nature and the human -canine hybrid body as a compositional strategy. A Version of the work with the title 'Little Gestures" was also publicly exhibited at Two Queen Gallery, in October/November 2020, and featured geolocated sound walk which could be accessed via the Echoes Sound Walk app, on approach to the gallery. Clicking on the round MAP circle will take you to the central exposition of my PhD: Deep Canine Topography.

2 Queens Members Show – Experimenting With Locative Media and Video Install

This three channel video work comprises of a number of incidental short mobile phone recordings, from several urban and suburban walks. These were used as a prompt for composing a short piece of music, responding to both the images and the canine POV sound walk, recorded earlier in 2020. I also experimented with merging canine and human soundscapes which led to two iterations of the same work. The first iteration was designed to be viewed online but was later adapted for a physical instal at Two Queens Gallery in October 2020.

This work offered the opportunity to test the use of geo-located sound alongside a 3 Chanel video installation. This was partly in response to the pandemic and difficulties in sharing headphones as a sound delivery method in the gallery and partly to test the Echoes xyz locative media application.

The concept for the install is that the sound is geo-located using the Echoes xyz application and triggered as you approach the venue. The 3 channel 10 min looped video element is installed in the gallery on three screens. The nature of the sound means that it can be read as a sound work, on approach, and merged with the looped video on encounter. The sound plays only once, but the videos are looped.

The sound comprises of a canine embodied binaural recording of a walk with the overdub of a time stretched canine breath (a snore to be precise). The video channels are mobile phone captures of crows and hover flies, all recorded on a walk, which flank the central screen of Dexter’s paws, walking in his sleep.

The screens are positioned at an angle to play with the idea of superior canine peripheral vision. They really need positioning slightly wider apart, but space was tight.

Two versions of the work exist. One here (to the left) is designed for single screen, and includes a musical composition, written in response to the sound of a walk, embracing rhythm and repetition. Unlike the gallery installed version it does not use the image of canine dreaming paws.

Bonus Content: Dexter visits the gallery.

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