Silence is therefore the only possible means of communication (1994/2008) Machine for Making Sense / Stephen Jones

Video recording of a Machine for Making Sense performance at the Sydney Opera 1994. Machine are Jim Denley, Amanda Stewart, Chris Mann, Stevie Wishart, Rik Rue with Julian Driscoll mixing. Two video cameras operated by Stephen Jones and Stuart Lynch. It was then edited and processed by Stephen Jones in the mid 2000’s. “On with the headphones and hit full-screen, full volume. Recorded in 1994 and completed in 2008 — Stephen Jones writes of “a very long process of building a visual analogue of the musical performance” — Machine for Making Sense, Silence is… offers a very special visual and musical experience, and an historically valuable one, capturing Machine for Making Sense relatively early in a career which built an international reputation. It also reveals Jones’ innovative, poetic and playful responsiveness to a collective that famously explores “relations between linguistics, poetry, speech, music, and notions of sound, science and politics.”