Electronic Audio/Video Instrument Descriptions




This second section of the catalog focuses upon the tools and instruments on exhibit. The barcodes in this section provide access to more in-depth examples of the origins and processes associated with each tool. Following the tools are similar descriptions of the installations which are also on exhibit. Likewise we include a list of tapes of associated artworks generated with many of the exhibited tools. These will be screened during the exhibition.
D.D.

FINALLY, video inherited the world that audio had held private for so long. As soon as the hegemony of the MG STUDIO began to crumble, an army of workers started pilfering the fireplace of the gods and diligently bringing it down to the people piece by piece.
More than a struggle for the new art, the effort under way was to transform the newly acquired knowledge: New language appeared, some from the tradition of art, some from mathematics and logics, some from technology. Finally, they merged into a different socio-political reasoning.

Take the word video: a latin word for seeing, a portion of a standard television signal, a small format recording system, a counter-cultural movement, an artform.

As in electronic music, the internal began to critique the external. From the most brilliant manifestos of Dziga Vertov, through Balasz and Bazin, the "imperial dominance of a camera" was to be questioned again.

On the surface video seemed too busy with the topics of the day, yet this particular discourse began to manifest through other, more pragmatic activity: The instrument building!

For me it was much, much more, and this is my attempt to narrate my technological wanderlust.
Woody Vasulka

N.B. –All the information about chronology is subject to generous doubt because it was obtained from the inventors themselves. -W.V.

Lee Harrison Associates
ANIMAC (Hybrid graphic animation computer)
Destroyed, documented on film

Don Buchla
BUCHLA 100 SERIES (Audio synthesizer)
Collection of Michael Czajkowsky, New York City

Robert Moog
MOOG MODULAR AUDIO SYNTHESIZER
Courtesy of Norman Lowrey, Professor of Music, Collection of Drew University, Madison, New Jersey
Donated by CBS (Columbia Broadcasting Systerm)

Bill Hearn
VMHM (Analog XYZ driver/sequencer)
Courtesy of Steve Anderson, Physics Department, Sonoma State University, Rohnert Park, California.
Collection of Bill Hearn

EMS
PUTNEY, MODEL VCS 3 (Audio synthesizer)
Collection of the Experimental Television Center, Ltd. & The State University of New York, Binghamton

Aldo Tambellini
BLACK SPIRAL (TV sculpture)
Engineering by Tracy Kinsel & Hank Reinbold (Awaiting restoration)
Collection of the Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse, New York

Glen Southworth
CVI (COLORADO VIDEO INC) QUANTIZER (Colorizer)
CVI DATA CAMERA (Camera/scan processor)
Collection of the Experimental Television Center, Ltd. & The State University of New York, Binghamton

Eric Siegel
EVS, ELECTRONIC VIDEO SYNTHESIZER (Analog)
Whereabouts unknown, last in the possession of Al Phillips, documented in photographs
DUAL COLORIZER (Analog)
Collection of the Vasulkas, Santa Fe, New Mexico

Stephen Beck
DIRECT VIDEO SYNTHESIZER (Analog)
(Awaiting restoration)
BECK VIDEO WEAVER (Digital)
Collection of Stephen Beck, San Francisco

Nam June Paik & Shuya Abe
PAIK/ABE VIDEO SYNTHESIZER (Keyer & colorizer)
& SCAN MODULATOR (a.k.a. the "Wobbulator")
Collection of the Experimental Television Center, Ltd. & The State University of New York, Binghamton

George Brown
VIDEO SEQUENCER (a.k.a. FIELD FLIP/FLOP SWITCHER, with digital control)
MULTIKEYER (Analog with digital control)
Collection of the Vasulkas, Santa Fe, New Mexico

Dan Sandin
IP (Analog IMAGE PROCESSOR)
Collection of Phil Morton, West Yellowstone, Montana

BM Etra & Steve Rutt
RUTT/ETRA SCAN PROCESSOR (Analog)
Collection of the Experimental Television Ltd. & The State University of New York, Binghamton

David Jones
JONES FRAME BUFFER (Digital buffer)
Collection of Gary Hill, Seattle, Washington

Don McArthur
SAID (SPATIAL AND INTENSITY DIGITIZER)
Collection of the Experimental Television Center, Ltd. & The State University of New York, Binghamton

Don McArthur & Jeff Schier
DIGITAL IMAGE PROCESSOR
Collection of the Vasulkas, Santa Fe, New Mexico