📢 PARTICLE MATTER is a multi-channel video and sound installation by Itziar Barrio in collaboration with sound artist Seth Cluett
🗓 DATE & TIME: September 30 to October 26, 2025. Open to the public: 11 am to 5 pm on Sat and Sun. Opening: Saturday September 30, 2025 from 3 – 5 pm.
Performance October 26, 2025
📍 LOCATION: Harvestworks Art and Technology Program. Building 10a, Nolan Park, Governors Island. New York City, USA.
Particle Matter is a materialist inquiry into manifestations of the micro by Itziar Barrio in collaboration with composer sound designer Seth Cluett. The film incorporates images of dust, smoke, and various geological events, as well as audio recordings from the historic anechoic chamber at Nokia Bell Labs which is considered one of the quietest places on Earth. Particle Matter highlights the interactions between seemingly distant or opposing forces. A new 2 channel moving image and 4 channel sound version will premiere at this exhibition and its live version will be performed at a later date.
Particle Matter is an audiovisual work by Itziar Barrio created in collaboration with composer and sound designer Seth Cluett. A materialist investigation into matter and multitudinous manifestations of the micro, Particle Matter approaches its subject in a rhizomatic fashion, utilizing the language of the montage–the dialectical technique of producing a new composite whole from fragments of moving images and sounds–to explore the forces catalyzing and created by the movements of the fragmented and microscopic; the pieces left over.
Many of the sound recordings included in Particle Matter were carried out at the historic anechoic chamber at Nokia Bell Labs (NJ), which absorbs over 99.995% of the incident acoustic energy above 200 Hz, and is considered one of the quietest places on Earth. Barrio and Cluett approach Particle Matter from the horizontal convergence of all the agents involved: images of geological phenomena, steam, gas, and particles; audio recordings of protests, dust of different origins. The live performance version expands on the original audiovisual work to feature live sound and image. Recordings from current protests as well as audio footage recorded in the anechoic chamber at Nokia Bell Labs will complement content from the original film.
This work was produced by AECID and supported in part by Nokia Bell Labs Experiments in Art and Technology program.
• BIOS
Itziar Barrio is an interdisciplinary artist producing long-term research-based projects that involve different agents and collaborators. By rewriting the dominant narratives through which our societies, identities, and realities are constructed, her work opens up new futures. Her survey exhibition was curated by Johanna Burton in 2018, and her monograph was published by SKIRA in 2023. Barrio has recently been awarded a 2024 Guggenheim Fellowship and 2024 NYFA/NYSCA Artist Fellow. Barrio’s work has been presented internationally at the 14th Shanghai Biennale, Salt Istanbul, Onassis ONX, e-flux, MACRO, MACBA, Museo del Banco de la República, tranzit Romania, and Havana Biennial. She has been a New Museum’s NEW INC (Art and technology incubator) member since 2020 and has received awards from Brooklyn Arts Council, NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, Foundation for Contemporary Arts, the Spanish Ministry of Culture and Spanish Academy in Rome among others. Barrio’s work has been written about in the Brooklyn Rail, BOMB, ARTFORUM, Art in America, The New York Times, ART PAPERS and other publications. She has lectured internationally and most recently at Whitney Museum’s Independent Study Program and Harvard University. She teaches at the School of Visual Arts and Sarah Lawrence College in NY.
Seth Cluett is an internationally recognized composer and artist whose quiet, patient practice explores the territory between the senses, with a compelling attention to perception. His work is driven by themes of ecological collapse and resilience, often expressed through materials found in nature. The recipient of grants from Meet the Composer and New Music USA, his work has been presented internationally at venues such as The Whitney Museum, MoMA/PS1, CONTEXT Art Miami, GRM, and STEIM. His concert work has been commissioned by ensembles ranging from TAK Ensemble to the Hong Kong Sinfonietta and the International Contemporary and is documented on Line, Sedimental, Notice, and Winds Measure recordings. Cluett is on the composition faculty at Columbia University, where he is Director of the Computer Music Center and Assistant Director of the Sound Art MFA Program. Since 2017 he has served as Artist-in-Residence at Nokia Bell Labs.