1 00:00:29,355 --> 00:00:32,708 —CHRISTIAN MARCLAY: Testing, one, two, one, two. Can you hear me? 2 00:00:32,708 --> 00:00:33,831 —MAN: Yes. 3 00:00:33,831 --> 00:00:38,937 —MARCLAY: I'm soft-spoken. But it-- it  feels like it really bounces around, 4 00:00:38,937 --> 00:00:40,740 so I hope you're happy with this sound. 5 00:00:50,898 --> 00:00:56,455 I was experimenting with records,  melting them in my kitchen in the stove. 6 00:00:56,455 --> 00:01:00,342 And uh, the fumes, I think, got to me. 7 00:01:06,420 --> 00:01:11,700 That night, I went to sleep and I had  this dream that I ate a record because 8 00:01:11,700 --> 00:01:16,260 I felt so nauseated. I thought, "Well,  maybe I could make a little video." 9 00:01:25,780 --> 00:01:35,000 I enjoyed music as a physical experience. I used  to love going to clubs and hearing music very loud 10 00:01:35,000 --> 00:01:38,866 that just would, you know, take over your body. 11 00:01:40,511 --> 00:01:42,858 Now, I regret it because I'm like half-deaf. 12 00:01:42,989 --> 00:01:49,886 But, um, I think there was something  fascinating about sound being objectified. 13 00:01:58,980 --> 00:02:04,200 My influences for DJing really came  more from Musique concrète or John Cage. 14 00:02:05,000 --> 00:02:09,440 So I was always interested  in the conceptual side of things. 15 00:02:09,440 --> 00:02:15,000 In the 80s, I started a band called  The Bachelors Even. It was a duo and my 16 00:02:15,000 --> 00:02:18,864 collaborator was a guitar player, Kurt Henry. 17 00:02:18,864 --> 00:02:20,281 That's when I started using records. 18 00:02:21,039 --> 00:02:29,079 I would record these skipping records and use cassettes  onstage as these background rhythmic loops. 19 00:02:29,079 --> 00:02:35,813 We had a lot of destructive actions, actually, breaking  things for the sound, uh, that it would make. 20 00:02:41,280 --> 00:02:47,640 A very liberating moment was punk rock. You know,  here were people performing without any training. 21 00:02:48,240 --> 00:02:54,720 The combination of punk rock and performance  art really allowed me to get involved in music. 22 00:02:58,200 --> 00:03:03,900 Everybody I was hanging out with were either  dancers, musicians, painters, sculptors, 23 00:03:03,900 --> 00:03:09,600 performance artists in the East Village, just  being creative and collaborating very often. 24 00:03:14,760 --> 00:03:19,200 I came to London with my wife.  We needed a change from New York. 25 00:03:23,340 --> 00:03:29,880 Over the years, I've done many different things.  When I was a kid, I would always be collaging. 26 00:03:31,560 --> 00:03:34,740 I'm still the same person, cutting and pasting. 27 00:03:36,540 --> 00:03:41,760 My work is quite eclectic. If I'm  doing something new, I'm excited, 28 00:03:41,760 --> 00:03:49,740 and I might work with a printer one day or with  film fragments that I collage or graphic scores. 29 00:03:51,420 --> 00:03:58,380 I think it's important to make discovery through  the knowledge of other people. That's what I've 30 00:03:58,380 --> 00:04:05,340 enjoyed about music all my life is it is a  collaborative effort. So the thread of my work 31 00:04:05,340 --> 00:04:13,140 maybe is sound. But sound is such a wide subject,  so it allows me to work in many different media. 32 00:04:14,280 --> 00:04:21,300 Video, because it includes sound and image,  is a good medium for me. Now, it's, of course, 33 00:04:21,300 --> 00:04:28,200 very easy. You can film a video on your iPhone  and edit it on the phone and just send it around. 34 00:04:28,902 --> 00:04:30,790 You hang this one and I'll hang this one? 35 00:04:30,892 --> 00:04:31,699 I see, yea. 36 00:04:32,180 --> 00:04:35,221 Otherwise they, ah the mobile goes... 37 00:04:35,221 --> 00:04:37,740 The Snapchat project came about as a surprise. 38 00:04:39,600 --> 00:04:43,020 For me, it was a chance to work  with contemporary technology. 39 00:04:46,620 --> 00:04:51,420 I'm like really a low-tech person. I'm  not-- not very good with computers. 40 00:04:53,220 --> 00:04:59,280 Because I don't use social media, I didn't know  what Snapchat was. So, I did a little research 41 00:04:59,280 --> 00:05:06,120 and realized that three-and-a-half billion Snaps  are created every day and that just blew my mind. 42 00:05:08,940 --> 00:05:14,853 I wanted to shift the focus so it wouldn't be on  the image but on the sound. 43 00:05:17,130 --> 00:05:19,087 It seems more active today. 44 00:05:19,087 --> 00:05:20,657 It's talking a lot to us today. 45 00:05:20,657 --> 00:05:23,037 What I like is when they all go on together. 46 00:05:23,037 --> 00:05:23,537 Yeah. 47 00:05:23,664 --> 00:05:26,032 So that we really get this chorus effect. 48 00:05:26,234 --> 00:05:26,734 Yeah. 49 00:05:26,936 --> 00:05:29,873 Right now the library is just one Snap for each frequency, right? 50 00:05:29,873 --> 00:05:31,873 We're going to have a thousand Snaps with each frequency 51 00:05:31,873 --> 00:05:32,784 and it's going to make it feel a lot better. 52 00:05:33,376 --> 00:05:36,828 The Snapchat engineers were amazing. 53 00:05:36,828 --> 00:05:41,662 They developed these algorithms  allowing me to find what I was looking for. 54 00:05:42,859 --> 00:05:45,668 People are going to have such a blast with this! 55 00:05:45,668 --> 00:05:47,228 —I think so, yeah. 56 00:05:52,320 --> 00:05:55,140 I ended up making five  different sound installations, 57 00:05:56,040 --> 00:06:00,720 most of them interactive, from  Snapchats that were publicly posted. 58 00:06:02,400 --> 00:06:06,780 The one that I spent the most time  working on was called "All Together." 59 00:06:10,380 --> 00:06:14,760 As I would maybe make some 10 turntables, here, 60 00:06:14,760 --> 00:06:20,580 I had 10 iPhones and I created  a four-minute mix of Snapchats. 61 00:06:21,639 --> 00:06:26,439 For me, what was interesting is that  this is a new form of communication. 62 00:06:26,880 --> 00:06:31,860 People are creating their own language using  image and sound, which for me, of course, 63 00:06:31,860 --> 00:06:36,120 is interesting because it is about image. And  I've always been very interested in images, 64 00:06:36,120 --> 00:06:40,260 even though sound is so important to my work. 65 00:06:48,240 --> 00:06:54,900 Over the years, I've collaborated with many  musicians and always felt intimidated by 66 00:06:54,900 --> 00:07:00,840 their incredible knowledge and years of  practice. But they were very encouraging 67 00:07:00,840 --> 00:07:06,480 in the sense that they thought that my  way of doing things was interesting. 68 00:07:10,740 --> 00:07:16,560 I can't read or write music traditionally,  uh, so I had to invent my own ways. 69 00:07:24,469 --> 00:07:29,989 The more recent performance I've  done is called "Investigations." 70 00:07:30,360 --> 00:07:35,400 It's a series of found photographs  which were cropped, and they show 71 00:07:35,400 --> 00:07:42,480 the hands of different pianists. I wanted to  provide this to people who can read music. 72 00:07:43,500 --> 00:07:51,060 The posture on the image has to be emulated.  So it's this overlap of different actions. 73 00:07:55,860 --> 00:08:00,900 I like to use the potential  of images to create music. 74 00:08:09,840 --> 00:08:16,020 I love onomatopoeias because they're words,  but at the same time, they're image. You can't 75 00:08:16,020 --> 00:08:23,280 really separate the word from the image.  It's a very expressive way to draw a word. 76 00:08:28,980 --> 00:08:31,740 A graphic score is really an open musical score. 77 00:08:32,760 --> 00:08:38,460 My graphic scores can be fragments  from comic books or photographs. 78 00:08:39,360 --> 00:08:47,100 I like the idea that an image can suggest  sound rather than a note on a staff line. 79 00:09:03,992 --> 00:09:09,543 The choice of the performer is really important.  It's almost like selecting an instrument. 80 00:09:16,680 --> 00:09:18,840 In order to work on that Manga scroll, 81 00:09:18,840 --> 00:09:24,660 I bought a lot of Manga translated  into English and I cut them up. 82 00:09:26,760 --> 00:09:29,220 —I think it's okay, yeah. 83 00:09:29,220 --> 00:09:33,240 —I mean, I can put more if you'd like it more  transparent. But I think you can see it anyway. 84 00:09:33,240 --> 00:09:34,320 —No, I think it's gonna work. 85 00:09:34,320 --> 00:09:36,100 —All right, cool. 86 00:09:38,040 --> 00:09:43,800 I never thought I would get interested in prints,  uh, and I've worked in different studios now. 87 00:09:44,700 --> 00:09:48,000 I used to work at Graphicstudio in Tampa. And then, 88 00:09:48,000 --> 00:09:50,820 when I moved to London,  the commute was a bit long. 89 00:09:56,400 --> 00:10:00,240 I became aware of Manga comic  books traveling in Japan and 90 00:10:00,240 --> 00:10:05,880 seeing everybody in the subway reading this  stuff. You know, it's such a popular thing. 91 00:10:08,880 --> 00:10:14,040 The woodgrain has an expressionist  quality. I thought this would be 92 00:10:14,040 --> 00:10:18,840 appropriate because the collage is made  out of fragments and is cut out and glued. 93 00:10:21,480 --> 00:10:25,920 They're reminiscent of Edvard Munch's  "Scream," which has these concentric 94 00:10:25,920 --> 00:10:29,640 lines that feel like the sound is  really coming out of the mouth. 95 00:10:33,854 --> 00:10:38,367 The exhibition at Paula Cooper was  very much about this anxiety mood 96 00:10:38,367 --> 00:10:41,777 that we're living in right now politically. 97 00:10:48,120 --> 00:10:51,660 If you overlap 48 war movies on top of each other, 98 00:10:51,660 --> 00:10:58,920 you end up with a cacophony and you can't quite  follow the narrative. It's not a pleasant video. 99 00:11:04,920 --> 00:11:09,960 The sound becomes quite aggressive.  It's just a loop and it goes on 100 00:11:09,960 --> 00:11:15,420 forever. And this tunnel vision, for  me, the video, is just a different 101 00:11:15,420 --> 00:11:20,280 way to express the kind of frustration  that we're all experiencing right now. 102 00:11:40,620 --> 00:11:47,820 I want to comment on the everyday life that  we're all living and the things that surround us. 103 00:11:49,800 --> 00:11:53,700 When I first came to London, every  day was a visual feast just because 104 00:11:53,700 --> 00:12:00,000 I was looking at things differently.  On my walk from the studio to home, 105 00:12:00,000 --> 00:12:05,460 I take a lot of pictures, though I don't know  these days if my camera is better than my iPhone. 106 00:12:08,040 --> 00:12:12,600 Recently, I've made animations with  some of these photographs of trash 107 00:12:12,600 --> 00:12:14,530 that I would find on the street. 108 00:12:16,985 --> 00:12:20,174 We showed the one with chewing gum in Times Square. 109 00:12:23,820 --> 00:12:26,460 For me, it's just a form of note-taking. 110 00:12:29,160 --> 00:12:35,160 It was nice to bring back to the street  what I had found on sidewalks in London. 111 00:12:40,246 --> 00:12:46,204 I wanna just be a dilettante for the  rest of my life. Just be able to change. 112 00:12:48,876 --> 00:12:54,014 The street can be a place of creativity  and the street can be the studio as well. 113 00:12:55,020 --> 00:13:01,860 The power of visual culture and of sound works  on us in a very subliminal way. But it's there. 114 00:13:03,000 --> 00:13:07,560 You never know when some idea's gonna  hit you. It can happen anywhere.