The Sound of True Art
I remember one particular summer in my childhood spent exploring the cliffs , beaches, woods, caves and landscapes of the south coast of Eire with my cousins. We knew every single inch of those cliffs, rocks and beaches along the Waterford coastline between Tramore and Dunmore East, so on one particular day we turned off a new found side road to head inland into, what was for us, uncharted territory. Half a mile along a road half hidden by trees , gorse and blackthornes we stumbled across an old cottage hidden in the overgrown foliage. We pushed open a stiff,but unlocked front door and found ourselves in a time capsule from the previous century. It was like discovering the Mary Celeste. Cups, plates and a fossilized pot of jam were on the table,along with sepia photographs of friends, family and loved ones gone long , long ago to who knows where or how.We stood, astonished with our feet in another era now covered with the dust of a hundred years. We stared with wide eyes and open mouths at that room perfectly preserved and filled with the memories and echoes of a forgotten generation and wandered how that house could have remained unnoticed and clearly unentered for so long. Then after hearing the erie creaks and groans of ancient oak beams stretching in the mild summer heat... we legged it!
The countryside was scattered with the frames of long deserted cottages and farms back then, many were deserted by families that had left for a better life in The States - and most were nothing more than broken sets of walls and rubble...so our find was very unique. Our artist - whose works form the background images of the page - is equally unique and it's not hard to see why stumbling over his art made all those memories come flooding back. But this astounding artist does not only make unique collages that stir the memories and feelings with a rich and textured visual tapestry, he also brings them to life.
Tracey Emmet once stirred the artworld with a physical exhibit in the form of her unmade bed ..it was later animated briefly (and some would argue brilliantly) by a pair of Japanese students who clmbed into her bed in the Tate and began jumping up and down on it repeatedly claiming that they were an exhibit.."This is art ! This is art!" they cried.
Yet the 'animation' added to and by the works of John Lambert would have left them all as speechless as that old cottage did myself and my cousin all those years ago . Johns 'exhibits' are brought to life with a mixture of moving visual arts and some of the most beautiful,simple and stirring phases of acoustic guitar carefully mixed with the sounds of ancient gadgetry and modern computerised wizardry as he regularly tours the venues of the Emerald isle.
In America, the last eighteen months have seen many audiences become overawed by the acoustic power and intense vocal passions of Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglovas Oscar winning Swell Season, while back home the works of John Lambert are overawing audiences to the same degree with his quiet and deeply reflective passionate audio visual dreamscapes as they pour forth a deep and gently audable mixture of feelings and emotive magic. Johns combination of sounds and art is the kind of podcasting and sound that makes strong, rough edged and worldly wise men want to shut themselves away in a darkened room , iscolated from the world, to quietly and secretly become enraptured in the sound of art and even cry...
So, as an old friend used say to me whenever I knocked his door ( and usualy totaly regardless of the weather)...
"Ah, Come in out of the warm and wet yourself by the fire"
John Lamberts 'Chequerboard' - 'Penny Black' album podcast is now available to buy from iTunes..and his world of imagery and sound can be discovered at the following places... His MySpace page
and his official 'non' space site
John has also been overseeing a new project in the form of an ongoing sound dialogue along with other international sound artists in conjunction with the 'Model Arts and Niland Gallery' in Sligo, Ireland, with some more inspirational pieces uploaded and to yet be uncovered here... at RELAY
All images ,music, videos , are the artwork, property and copyright of John Lambert and Chequerboard...
Memories curtousy of Mairtin O'Riain 2007/08
