Drawing on the concept of musique concrete, the combination and manipulation of found sound to create musical landscapes, Nathan Gray presents a new installation combining, linking and manipulating objects.

Attack Decay Sustain Release explores synthesised and manufactured elements as constituent parts of both sonic and sculptural composition. The exhibition explores what happens when elements are repeated and recombined in different ways and how these elements change and change the spaces into which they are released. These primarily musical considerations are combined with elements of chance and simplification, further aligning avant-garde compositional processes with the protocols of installation. Consisting of a sound piece and correlating installation, Attack Decay Sustain Release will explore what can be carried from one practise to the next and what can be learned from thinking about each practise through the conventions and terms of the other.

Nathan Gray draws on experimental and DIY electronic music, extending these processes into installation to expand concepts of visual and spatial composition. Gray’s installations are created through improvisation, the contrasting of weight, colour, timings and tones that are then layered, clustered and diffused. The individual elements of Gray’s installations are usually handmade and intimately linked to the maker, evoking handicraft and DIY traditions. Gray’s materials are typically drawn from cultures and systems that are outside of commercial manufacturing processes, and are sourced through travel and extensive research into these fields. Through the creation of complex, personal and inventive interrelationships between objects, and the use of disruptive compositional techniques, Gray maintains a dynamic tension between objects, their origins and his processes. The results are shifting, multi-hued clusters of interlinked objects that impart a feeling of movement, celebration and the potential for multiple unfoldings. Ultimately, Gray seeks to expand the definition of composition, and reinvigorate the relationship between the subject and the sonic landscape.

Download attachments
Exhibition catalogue ADSReader (3.5MB), featuring essays by James Deutsher, Francis Plagne, Jared Davis, Helen Johnson and Simon Taylor

Special Event
The French (Nathan Gray, Julie Burleigh and Bianca Hester) and Free Choice Duo (Jarrod Zlatic and Jessica McElhinney) will perform at Craft Victoria in the final week of Attack Decay Sustain Release
Date: Thursday 15 October, 8pm
Bookings: Not required
Cost: Free!