“What I try to do in my projects is not sound or visual, it is audiovisual”: Alex Augier

The French artist Alex Augier presented _nybble_ within the framework of ISEA2017 – 16th International Image Festival. This soundscape is a commitment to audiovisual production, since its interest is to find that both light and sound complement each other. This is an interview in which Alex tells us a little about his creative career and his time at the Festival.

• Tell us about your journey as an artist.

As an artist I have a first project, my previous project called oqpo_oooo. It is an audiovisual performance like _nybble_. I presented it for the first time at the Scopitone Festival in Nantes and it was produced by Stereolux. That's my entry into the world of numbers.
Above all, I feel like a musician and I also like technology, programming, architecture, design, all of this. And indeed, I try to reflect to make a coherent synthesis of all this and the audiovisual performance was a good answer. Because I feel like a musician, I privilege the scene, it's my playing field. And then I try to integrate other elements. Digital is quite general as a term, but it allows for this type of connection (…). The digital not only as a tool but as an aesthetic.
The first project is a cube that I am inside and the cube is closed. People see only the three phases presented. It's in black and white, just lines, very strict, with a very electronic sound. It is only done with the computer, the treatments are digital but specific. It is not the digitization of analog things but specific treatments of the digital. And, on the other hand, I have the project that I present during the Festival where the cube opens. We can see inside. This one is in color, the music is made with synthesizers, it's more organic. There is a livelier side, it unfolds in space in a more demonstrative way than simple stereo diffusion. So there is like an opposition, but at the same time a continuity for me. These two projects are part of the same 'continuum'. What can we do with digital? Two personal proposals.

• What does _nybble_ mean, the name of the performance presented at ISEA2017?

_nybble_, connects to the title of the preceding project. The previous project is digital, so there is the cube, which is a very digital shape, almost a symbol in this area. The title was to resonate with all this aspect. The title is oqpo_oooo. The idea is to continue the architecture of the audio-digital signal, with the history of the tapes, etc., and to give the project a coherent title, one that is graphic-visual. We can't necessarily pronounce the title. It is to suggest that it is an audiovisual performance. So why _nybble_? Because it preserves this number idea, but _nybble_ is around 4, and 4 is half of 8, it's a demi-octet; in French it's a 'quartet' and in English it's 'nybble'. 'Quartet' seemed obvious.

• Regarding the process of creating _nybble_, do you start by making the sound, the light…?

No, what I try to do in my projects is not sound or visual, it is audiovisual (...). With my controllers, my synth, when I hit a button; It works on both. That is to say, if I change the input of my sound, my sound will enter progressively, the visuals will gradually enter. I don't have two buttons to manage, everything is connected, I have my hand on both. So I try to think both at the same time and that's why I work in parallel. I didn't do the sound and then the visual, I work at the same time. Of course, I reflect on how everything is related to constitute a single thing. Finally, I go back and forth to test. I try to see what works best. So I think both at the same time, knowing that the visual is easier to do. For me, the most delicate part, which needs more work, is the music.

• Because?

I don't know, because I'm more demanding with music, to finish it, to get to the end of my project. It takes longer, longer than the rest.

• The work is in the form of a cube. Where do you prefer the performance to be seen from? Is it better to sit at the bottom or at the top of the room?

Down in the center. It is better to be in front than to have a view above. And since there is a spatialization, there is a right-left, far-near game. That is to say that the audiovisual moves around me and for the public there is an experience to the right, left, near or far. So the center is the best place. And I think, the sides are not good places because we have the risk of hearing half of the music.

• Tell us about your experience in Colombia, is it the first time you come to Latin America and the country?

It is not the first time I come to Latin America. I was a guest in Brazil, I played in Sao Paulo and Porto Alegre; I stayed a short time, 4 days I think. Well, I had already come as a traveler, to Rio, Brasilia and to the northeast of Brazil, in Natal. It is the first time I come to Colombia. I presented _nybble_ in Bogotá a few days ago. In any case, I begin to understand that it's another world, more than the other times, even though I don't have enough time left and I don't make opinions so quickly, I know I need time and I like it. So I do not claim to know Colombia and, in terms of impression, it is another world.

• Do you have new projects now or for the future?

What I would like to do follows an audiovisual proposition through a scenic performance; In other words, I focus on the musical part and the audiovisual part because I have ideas on how to install it technically. Keep this idea of scenic spatialization, not a spatialization around people. And for the visual, now I'm in contact with a Spanish artist, maybe we'll do something (…). Also the idea is to present _nybble_ in the center of a room and the public around it. In fact, it is possible, the project is conceived for that too. First it is for the scene, but since everything is modular, everything is independent, we put the screens where we want. We can, for example, put the structure in the center, have a diffusion like that. So, yes, I am in this idea of proposing something, of deepening this issue.

• Have you ever done it?

No never. I do not present my projects alone. They are always shared scenes, so the issue is complicated.