Like the terrifying basis of an engraving by English artist and poet William Blake, the audiovisual work Brilliant Noise pulls us towards a cosmic confines. Two English artists, Ruth Jarman and Joseph Gerhardt, collaborating since 1996, are the driving force behind this 'UFO', working under the science-fiction name "Semiconductor". Originally, this collaboration was meant for musical purposes, and Semiconductor began by creating Sound Films where the connections between sound and image were systematically explored. They bring up the structural relationships between music and architecture, transform sound tracks into visual materials and explore the idea of abstract moving landscapes. Since 1999, they have worked on digital animations in order to transcend the constraints of time, trying to explore the physical world beyond the human experience through that bias, thus hoping to question our actual existence on Planet Earth. In Brilliant Noise the artists propose an astral symphony to us, re-enacting some of the sun's finest moments. This work was made in the context of a residency programme initiated by the British Art Council at the department of Space Sciences of the University of Berkeley, California, in collaboration with NASA, giving them access to a multitude of solar pictures taken by orbiting satellites. With the help of astronomers, the artists went through countless gigabytes of archives, and compiled some of these digital scans in order to compose a video animation on the oscillations of the sun. Brilliant Noise may be perceived as a documentary, without taking into account the audio recordings and the montage. Through a process of audio data processing, the artists have used images to control the fluctuations of sound; according to the brightness of the image the sound varies, crackles, buzzes and falters before harmonising. The sound material first provides natural radiation from the sun. The interaction between sound and image is perfect and allows for an elaborate fiction of sound and visuals, with each burst of particle energy coating a sound in colour; a ground noise which is almost constant throughout all of the sequences, revealed as terrestrial or extra-terrestrial interference, is illustrated through a white grain. The compilation of images itself is "chronological", driven by the spectral frequencies of the data documents. It is a universal natural history, interpreted by the artists, wishing to make us conscious of the sublime chaos of our cosmos. Semiconductor delivers to us a fused landscape, made of geysers of fire that move and disappear by the grace of astral winds and the artists' audio-visions. The spectacle that takes place in Brilliant Noise is extraordinary, and will seduce romantics that exalt in mysterious forms and turbulent landscapes.

Florence Parot
Transl. Jasper Schelstraete