PANORAMA

As part of “New Sounds”, a musical project inspired by Suna and İnan Kıraç Foundation collections, Alican Çamcı makes a sound documentary inspired by the changing face of Istanbul as well as his own personal relationship to the city. At the centre of this documentary, which is a combination of field recordings, interviews, and pieces of music that are referenced partially or fully, lies the piano adaptation of a chanson-motet composed by Guillaume Dufay in the 15th century. The piece titled Lamentatio sanctae matris ecclesiae Constantinopolitanae, is a lament that Dufay wrote a year after Istanbul’s conquest in 1453. The installation is hosted by a piano: Once belonging to Maria Callas, and housed by the Museum today, the piano is surrounded by a metal construction, which is transformed into a speaker by the transducers, and becomes a structure that the installation can be listened through. The installation also functions as a background for live performance. A piece that interacts with the installation for piano and live electronics will be performed by Jerfi Aji. Panorama can be experienced at the Museum’s Orientalist Paintings Collection exhibition floor for one month following the performance.

Musicians

Jerfi Aji, piano
Alican Çamcı, electronics

About Alican Çamcı

Alican Çamcı’s output includes works for small and large ensembles, electro-acoustic compositions, solo instrumental music, and sound installations. His recent works feature an investigation of sound as a potentially documentary medium. He seeks to explore this aspect through the use of field and speech recordings, found sounds, everyday materials in relation to the performative dimension introduced by the musicians in a live situation.

A native of Istanbul, Turkey, he studied composition at the Peabody Conservatory with Michael Hersch. Currently he is a Ph.D. candidate in the University of Chicago, where he continues his studies with Augusta Read Thomas, Anthony Cheung, and Sam Pluta. In addition to his studies, he has received further instruction from composers such as, Clarence Barlow, Carola Bauckholt, Pierluigi Billone, Beat Furrer, Georg Friedrich Haas, Isabel Mundry, Alberto Posadas, and Matthias Spahlinger in masterclasses and academies such as ManiFeste 2017, Forum des Jeunes Compositeurs 2016, Impuls 2015, among others. His music has been performed by ensembles such as Ensemble Dal Niente, ECCE, eighth blackbird, Ensemble Intercontemporain, Ensemble Mise-en, International Contemporary Ensemble, Le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne, Oerknal!, Spektral Quartet, the [Switch~ Ensemble], and soloists such as Jerfi Aji, Miranda Cuckson, Gleb Kanasevich, Ciro Longobardi, Andrew Nogal, Heather Roche, Eva Zöllner, and Stas Venglevski. In addition to his concert music, his collaborative work with the Turkish filmmaker and media artist Deniz Tortum have been featured in festivals and exhibitions such as Sharjah Biennial Istanbul Offsite 2017, IFF Colombo 2014, SXSW 2013, !F Istanbul 2013, and 22nd Istanbul Short Film Festival.

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