Rocker
PJ Harvey hopes glass room will reflect history
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[January 28, 2015] By
Martinne Geller
LONDON (Reuters) - Art
rocker PJ Harvey hopes that recording inside a glassed
room at Somerset House in central London will help draw
on the likes of Elizabeth I, who lived on its grounds
before she was queen, and Oliver Cromwell, who lay in
state there.
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A select group of visitors lucky enough to get tickets will
watch Harvey, one of England's most original pop artists,
chipping away at the coal face of music creation.
Polly Jean Harvey, who has balanced eclecticism and mainstream
popularity in a career spanning two decades, is recording her
ninth album at the arts and cultural center on the River Thames
in a celebration of the process of making art rather than the
product.
"I want it to operate as if we're an exhibition in an art
gallery," Harvey said in an interview for a program accompanying
the installation, tickets for which sold out in less than half
an hour.
During a month-long run, "Recording in Progress" will let some
2,000 people watch Harvey and a cast of musicians, producers and
engineers through one-way glass in 45-minute visits.
There are no guarantees what spectators will see. Emilie
Vansuypeene, a 35-year-old musician from Lille, France, was
"prepared to see people arguing for 50 minutes over one note".
"I didn’t know what to expect,” Vansuypeene said.
Through windows on two sides of a bright white room, a few dozen
people watched Harvey, dressed head-to-toe in black, seated
amidst a forest of sharp-angled microphone stands and a sea of
cables snaking across the floor.
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She played saxophone while others played guitar, drums, saxophone
and bass clarinet over a track that seemed not to belong to any of
the songs whose lyrics were hung on the wall.
"It was an interesting passage," Vansuypeene said afterwards. "It
wasn’t just a coffee break.”
In the program interview -- with Michael Morris, co-director of
Artangel, which commissioned the show -- Harvey says she likes
Somerset House's riverside location and history.
Before hosting a range of government offices, the original Somerset
House, built in the 16th century, was a residence of the British
throne.
"All that history will fuel me and help tap into a different level
of consciousness," said Harvey, who also paints, draws, sculpts and
writes poetry.
Artangel's Morris said the exhibition had exceeded all expectations
in terms of spectators' reactions.
"I had a hunch that it would be a layered and complex experience,"
Morris said. "But I think it's worked out even richer than
imagined."
(Editing by Michael Roddy/Jeremy Gaunt)
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