Join The Ironing Maidens for a presentation and performance of their new iron instruments.
ABOUT THIS EVENT
The Ironing Maidens turn irons and ironing boards into electronic instruments, in an attempt to deconstruct stereotypical ideas of gender and its assigned roles. This latest iteration of the project aims to further investigate the relationships we have with objects or instruments, and the structures that inform the design and the performance of these instruments in an installation setting. The project uses a sonic cyberfeminist lens to critically explore aesthetic and relational hierarchies at the intersection of sound, gender and technology. Three irons and ironing boards have been hacked and retrofitted with embedded electronic instruments that together create a sonic network. This network of iron instruments listens to each other and the environment and changes their sonic state based on the information they hear.
A style of granular synthesis is used to obscure the original source signal, to transform it, to decouple it from its original context. Order, context, and meaning are all destabilised. The ever so familiar and recognisable bleep of a washing machine turning on is split into thousands of tiny micro grains. Micro collages of the sounds of global entrapment, reimagined in a somewhat other worldly, noisy new reality.
This presentation and live performance will lift the lid on the iron instruments and demonstrate the inner workings of the embedded instruments and their application in an installation setting.
Date: 14th JANUARY 2023
Time: 11 AM — 12 NOON
Where: NorthSite Contemporary Arts at Bulmba-ja, 96 Abbott Street, Cairns City
Image: Melania Jack and Patty Preece standing in-front of their exhibition installation ‘Strike’ at NorthSite Contemporary Arts, 2022. Photo: Frei Films