Jesse Stewart
Project Description: Pyrophonic Harmonics
Jesse Stewart’s video installation “Pyrophonic Harmonics” explores the phenomenon of thermoacoustics: using heat to create sound. As blow torch flames dance inside glass tubes of different lengths, drones of different pitches are elicited; the longer the tube, the lower the pitch of the drone. Having two tubes of slightly different lengths (and therefore slightly different frequencies) results in the acoustic phenomenon of beating: periodic variations in volume that results from the interference between the two sounds where the rate of the beating corresponds to the difference between the two frequencies involved.
The sense of alchemy in this work–turning one form of energy intoanother–serves as a metaphor for the act of adapting an essentially acoustic phenomenon into the visual medium of video. It also reinforces the synaesthetic aspects of Stewart’s creative practice in general, which routinely blurs the lines between the visual and sonic arts.
Artist Biography
Jesse Stewart is an award-winning artist, percussionist, composer, improviser, instrument builder, and writer dedicated to reimagining the boundaries between artistic disciplines.
As an artist, Stewart has exhibited audio-visual installation-based work in solo, group, and juried art exhibitions at a variety of private and public galleries. Two major solo exhibitions have resulted in the publication of catalogues about his work: Wheels of Time (2003) shown at the Macdonald Stewart Art Centre in Guelph and Waterworks (2005-6), shown at the Robert McLaughlin Gallery in Oshawa, the Glenhyrst Gallery of Brant in Brantford, and the Thames Gallery in Chatham. In the summer of 2005, he contributed a performance and a sculptural work to a group show titled Demons Stole My Soul: the Rock and Roll Drum Set in Contemporary Art at the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art in Toronto.
As a musician, he works primarily in the areas of jazz, new music, and free improvisation. He has performed with many internationally acclaimed musicians including Michael Snow, George Lewis, Roswell Rudd, William Parker, Bill Dixon, Joe Mcphee, Maggie Nicols, David Mott, Evan Ziporyn, and many others. He has performed at music festivals across the country and made numerous compact disc recordings.
Much of his creative work crosses disciplinary boundaries, exploring the links between the visual and the sonic arts. For example, in the year 2000, he was commissioned by the Guelph Jazz Festival to create a ‘jazz opera’ entitled Passages with celebrated Canadian jazz poet Paul Haines and Governor General’s award-winning video artist David Rokeby.
After majoring in both visual art and in music as an undergraduate student at the University of Guelph, he went on to complete two Master of Arts degrees concurrently at York University in Toronto: one in ethnomusicology and another in music composition. His composition teachers included James Tenney and David Mott. In 2008, Stewart completed doctoral level studies at the University of Guelph where he was the first recipient of the Brock Doctoral Scholarship, the university’s most prestigious graduate award. He is now a professor in Carleton University’s School for Studies in Art and Culture.
