What a whirlwind of emotion this past week. I wish to share, but my main thought right now as I type is that it’s hard to write genuinely knowing these journal entries will be pressed to the blockchain and publicized in perpetuity.
Daunting.
I guess the solution in the face of that is to just be sincere. If my vision manifests and art music succeeds I imagine these entries will be read and studied in the way that Brahms’ or Schumann’s letters were. It’s reassuring to know that I can’t be embarrassed if I’m dead. I don’t mean to say that I wish for posthumous success, just that it’s helpful to project myself 100 years from now and write these entries with the full breadth of my humanity so that they might persevere through time.
Painting tl;dr
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CITY:Charlotte, NC -
MUSEUM:The Mint Museum -
PAINTING:Chimborazo from Riobamba -
ARTIST:Louis Remy Mignot -
OBSERVATION DATE:Feb 2, 2023
Music tl;dr
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CITY:New York, NY -
LOCATION:72nd & Park -
AUDIO SKETCH:Adventure, for Mignot -
COMPOSER:Niles Luther -
CREATION DATE:Feb 21, 2023
The Museum
The Mint Museum. Cute. Interesting design. I enjoyed its situation within the Levine Center of the Arts, the complex housing 3 different museums. The lady at the front desk was friendly, which improved my mood more than I care to admit. Perhaps I’m too accustomed to the cool detachment I often associate with the individuals tending the Art World Front Desk™.
You know I’ve been thinking, why is it that I love nature and museums so much, like SO much? I think the reason has to do with the silence. It’s so peaceful, it’s so reassuring. It’s a place I know I can go and sit and rest my ears. As a musician, as a composer, my ears are the primary way that I interpret the world. I’m so affected by sound, it’s very difficult for me to be in an environment that accosts this sense. But the museum… the snow covered forest… both have low noise floors. In both environments my watch is not frantically vibrating on my wrist, trying to warn me that the current db SPL of my environment will permanently damage my hearing if I’m exposed long term (as it does when I play the show every night).
No, it is quiet. I take so much solace in that.
I was distracted in the museum, as my mind was on a new development. I’ve been living quite monastically on tour, a total removal from social media, alcohol, excess spending, all the fun things really (🙃). I eat Huel, a nutritionally complete protein powder, for my meals to save money.
What is this sacrifice for?
The music. The future. I want to devote myself to the work, the work that sustains me and gives my life meaning.
It’s somewhat troublesome that almost all social interaction feels like a distraction from the project. I wish to work 70 hours a week, totally sacrificing everything enjoyable to the mission of building this genre of music. Yet, this week I opened up room for new companions, feeling myself pulled away from sound, closing my ears, opening my eyes…
It’s amusing to me, this paradox of wanting to create something that captures the full expression of humanity, and yet the full expression of humanity, at least my humanity, invariably draws me closer towards people and further from the inanimate objects, the art, the artifice, I surround myself with. What is to be done?
The Painting
Here is another painting. I like this one as it’s a landscape of a foreign land, a theme that is not yet in the collection. It’s a good opportunity to write something unique and non western. I’m eager to explore the sound of this landscape. I’m hearing 7/8.
During the middle decades of the 19th century, a small number of adventurous American landscape painters traveled to South America, seeking new subject matter that would interest their patrons. Part of the region's appeal was rooted in such legends as El Dorado, the Enchanted City of Patagonia, and the Island of the Amazons, all of which made it appear to be an exotic, unspoiled, tropical paradise full of mystery, danger, and perhaps, treasure.
Louis Remy Mignot, an artistic prodigy from South Carolina, accompanied Frederic Church on his second trip to South America (specifically, to Ecuador) in 1857. This trip provided Mignot artistic fodder for years to come, including paintings like Chimborazo from Riobamba. Here, Mignot has rendered beautifully and with great attention to detail the tropical trees and plants of the region. He further demonstrated his skill by capturing their reflections in the calm surface of the river and by creating interesting pockets of light and shadow, keeping the viewer's eye moving across the composition. Mount Chimborazo, an inactive volcano, is the highest mountain in Ecuador and was a frequent backdrop in both Mignot and Church's paintings.
Wall text for Chimborazo from Riobamba. The Mint Museum, North Carolina
Musical Response
The following music NFT is my initial response to Louis Remy Mignot's ‘Chimborazo from Riobamba,’ recorded on Feb 21, 2023 via voice memo at a private residence in New York, NY. The cover art is a sineprint (a graphed room frequency response) of my room in the hotel.
7/8 meter, just like I promised!
That’s all for now.
Most Sincerely,
Niles Luther