Xu Cheng

A Year of Random Music


BY ART MATTERS 天目里美术馆 initiated an annual sound art project, An Annual Poem, in the eight elevator carriages in the OōEli campus. Through the voices of the various interactive sound works, BY ART MATTERS 之馆 communicates and connects with the visitors of OōEli.


BY ART MATTERS 天目里美术馆 commissioned artist Xu Cheng to create an interactive sound installation, A Year of Random Music, installed in the four elevators ascending to the ground square of the OōEli campus. A Year of Random Music is an interactive sound installation in which the artist records the sounds of five Instruments including xylophone, bell, violin, horn, and guitar, as well as the vocal passage. These sounds are triggered randomly with the change of the number of people in the elevator.

Every day between 8 am and 10 pm, music is produced by the "collaboration" of the audience in the elevator -- the number of instruments produced is determined by the number of people, creating a "chord" or even a "symphony". At the same time, each change in the number of people triggers a vocal paragraph from the annual calendar produced by the artist. This randomness will provide you with a different experience every time you take the ride.


Xu Cheng is a Sound artist living in Shanghai. He is the winner of the 2012 Ars Electronica Festival. His practice involved experimental music, free improvisation, electronic music, and other fields. Meanwhile, he focuses on the relationship between sound and social space and its related behavior and manifestation.

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