A Lecture in Chemistry, a concert of George Bretcht's music

A Lecture in Chemistry: A Concert of George Bretcht's Music was a performance by Grupa ETC [The ETC Group] (Antoni Michnik, Anna Płonka, Klaudia Rachubińska, Maciej Ratajski, Agnieszka Szostakiewicz) for 15. SURVIVAL Art Review that took place at the lecture theatre of the Chemistry Auditorium in Wrocław, 25.06.2017. It was part of the Sound art forum curated by Daniel Brożek.

Grupa ETC [The ETC Group] is a collective of artists and researchers who work with the artistic tradition of the neo-avant-garde, experimental music and intermedia art.

George Brecht, one of John Cage’s most well-known students, was a chemist by education. In the late 1950s he invented text scores, so-called “event scores”, which would later become the canon of experimental music and performance. Associated with the Fluxus milieu of artists, Brecht wrote short instructions in the form of orders or pictures. His Event Scores were works at the intersection of sound composition, visual poetry and performance scenarios, intended to facilitate shared performance. Brecht’s work not only blurred the boundaries between the artist, the performer and the audience, but also between the techniques of reproducing the artwork — print and recording, text and graphics. The performance by Grupa ETC [The ETC Group] was an attempt at interpreting Brecht’s compositions in the acoustic context of the lecture theatre of the Chemistry Auditorium. It was based on the acoustic properties of the original space of the lecture hall and the potential of sound events in Brecht’s pieces.

Program:

Three Lamp Events / Drip Music
Two Durations
Instruction
Three Window Events
Suitcase
Two Umbrellas
Flute Solo
Four Chemists
String Ouartet
Two Elimination Events
Sink
Air Conditioning
Intermission
Three Broom Events
Candle Piece For Radios
Keyhole
The Chemistry of Music
- Cell Division
- Untitled (Man With Flute German)
- Rubber Tubing
Two Vehicle Events
Three Telephone Events
For a Drummer / Three Aqueous Events

Video documentation of the performance was displayed at the Pokazówka [Showpiece] event curated by Wojtek Zrałek-Kossakowski on the 6th of October 2023 at Jasna 10: Społeczna Instytucja Kultury Krytyki Politycznej.