Like many of our staff, Physical Computing Specialist Jeremy Keenan maintains his own practice outside of the College. An expert in his field, he is sharing his passion for sound art across the globe.
Jeremy has already been jetsetting this summer, recently taking part in Vancouver’s International Symposium on Electronic Art. With a presentation in Lithuania and a commission in Bangladesh upcoming, he is certainly in demand.
So how does his day job influence his practice? “It’s mutually beneficial for me and the students,” he explains. “The projects they bring to me are often quite challenging – outside of my specific area of expertise, or things I haven’t done before. In helping them, I’m also increasing my knowledge and my ability to help other students.”
“The facilities are great and, most importantly, inspiring – even sometimes verging on manic, in the most positive way. Between myself and others in the lab, there’s plenty of expertise to cover any project.”
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- Garden of Signals @ Jeremy Keenan
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- Oscillations in Love and Light @ Jeremy Keenan
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- Oscillations in Love and Light @ Jeremy Keenan
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- Garden of Sound @ Jeremy Keenan
New ideas, new challenges
There’s never a dull moment, with students from across all disciplines coming to the team with their projects. “One recent project was a light that used a real-time clock to chart the time and translate that into a representation of the sun at a given point of the day,” says Jeremy. “It used a few hundred LEDs, creating a picture using the circle of light.”
“In another project, a student on the Material Futures course made an eight-foot fan. It had a large, powerful motor to change the speed of the blades which had an iridescent property and a spectrum of colours was then projected on the blades to produce a psychedelic visual effect.”
Alongside his international engagements, Jeremy works with a curatorial organisation in south London, called Call & Response. Their upcoming exhibition with Jacob Kirkegaard will use sound recordings of the metal pipes that released sewer gas in Victorian London. You can also catch Jeremy at the De La Warr pavilion and the Milton Keynes Gallery in November.
More information:
– Jeremy’s staff profile
– Jeremy’s website