4'33" for Mariachi (2012)

Florian Tuercke

Florian Tuercke, 4'33" for Mariachi
Florian Tuercke, 4'33" for Mariachi
Florian Tuercke, 4'33" for Mariachi

Florian Tuercke’s artistic work is preoccupied with the examination of acoustics in public space. Since 2005 he has been working on the long term project URBAN AUDIO, researching compositional phenomena in the acoustic structure of urban space. To this purpose Tuercke installs tailor-made string instruments at public sites, e.g. at intersections, subsequently transforming the recorded ambient sounds into music. In an additional project with acoustic space, the video piece 4'33" for street music, Tuercke has ten street musicians in Mexico City perform John Cage’s 4'33". In the year of the centennial of John Cage’s birth this adaption of the famous piece to public space is both homage and persiflage. “The sound experience, which I prefer to all others is the experience of silence. And this silence, almost everywhere in the world now is traffic …” (John Cage, 1991)