REMIX PROJECTS
GEHEIMNISSE EINER SEELE
Remix project
2009
The Austrian director G.W. Pabst's silent film "Geheimnisse einer Seele" (The Secrets of a Soul, 1926) is based on one of Sigmund Freud's case studies. It was the first film that addressed psychoanalysis and combines abstract and surreal dream sequences with scenes from an everyday bourgeois world. The film grows out of this tension between two mutually exclusive worlds, which each threaten the existence of the other. The story and structure of the film provide a good starting point for music that exists on the boundaries between contemporary composed and improvised music.
The video score, which Mia Makela will play live during the performance, consists of new combinations of shots, scenes, people, objects, places and sceneries from the original silent film. The complexity of the graphic material contributes to the psychological and visual complexity of the performance as whole, which merges the unmistakable aesthetics of expressionist silent film with the experimental adventures of contemporary sound and moving image composition and performance.
The visuals fulfill the function of a score for the one.night.band musicians, who "read" it from their video monitors and who as a sound body reflect the conscious and subconscious complexity of human existence, where the whole consists of individual parts, each complete, in some way self-contained yet always interactive and interdependent on the other elements. The essence of the ensemble lies in each individual member's personal contributions to the sound, each individual background, thought process and way of playing.
CANCIONES PARA PEDRO ALMODOVAR
Remix project
2008
Mia Makela was invited to create a remix of Pedro Almodovars filmography to celebrate the director at Noche en Blanco event in Madrid. Makela went meticulously thru his 16 films by date, studying his techniques and created a 20-min remake to the compositions of Alberto Iglesias. The music was performed by the Spanish RTVE orchestra outdoors for an audience of 4000 people.
YA SOLO HABLA DE AMOR
Spoken word / visual improvisation
2009
Makela was invited to collaborate with infamous Spanish writer Ray Loriga, to create visual dialogue with a recital of his book Ya Solo Habla de Amor (Now Only Talks of Love). She created a remix with Tarkovskys films and improvised with the spoken word performance.
PORGY&BESS IN HELL
Remix project
2004
Audiovisual collaborative performance with musician C.D. (Christian Dergarabedian), based on the audio and videomaterial of the experimental american video artist Leslie Thornton (Peggy and Fred in Hell, a work that has been in process for 17 years).
PERFORMANCES
Vienna Konzerthaus 2009
Sophiensaale. Berlin 2010
Composers Lounge.Vienna 2010
Audio at Vienna Konzerthaus:
Mia Zabelka _ E-Violin, Voice, Electronics, Laptop
Zahra Mani _ Laptop, Contrabass
Franz Hautzinger _ Trompete
Manon-Liu Winter _ Piano
Martin Janicek _ Percussion
Audio at other performances:
Mia Zabelka _ E-Violin, Voice, Electronics, Laptop
Zahra Mani _ Laptop, Contrabass
Video: Mia Makela
Other performances by Zabelka, Mani & Makela
Video: Mia Makela
Audio: Alberto Iglesias/ RTVE orchestra
PERFORMANCE
Noche en Blanco, Madrid 2008
Video: Mia Makela
Word: Ray Loriga
PERFORMANCE
Camon, Alicante 2009
Video: Mia Makela
Audio: Christian Dergarabedian
PERFORMANCES
Fundacio tapies. Barcelona 2004
Commissioned by STITCH & SPLIT-Selves and Territories in Science Fiction organized by CONSTANT.