Initially, I was supposed to join Benjamin on this journey but was unfortunately prevented from going. A month later, we undertook a trip along to the locations that impressed Benjamin the most. I recorded these through 3D scans, with those impressions I went to work and created various worlds that the tour depicts internally and externally. As a viewer, you step along, as it were, to the rippling music.

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 – 1750) 6 Suites for cello, BWV 1007-1012
Performed by:
Benjamin Glorieux, cello
Klaas Verpoest & Johan Van Mol, video artist
Steven Reymer, Light Design

“Weg van Bach” is a coproduction of Klara Festival and Bozar
11 March 2023, Klara Festival – Bozar, Henry Le Boeuf Hall (B)

My contribution consists of two different components that are inextricably linked. On the one hand, there is the visual component for the live performance ‘TTT plays FFF/FFF by TTT’, performed by Het Collectief. This performance consists of three compositions: Feldman’s ‘Why Patterns?’ and two new pieces composed by David Fennessy and Jean-Luc Fafchamps respectively. On the other hand, there is the ‘Why Patterns? ‘ installation consisting of 4 modules of 3 compact screens each (there are three musicians/instruments), which can be seen as a prelude or visual research to the actual performance.

What if each instrument represents a star and you assume that you can apply seismological, hydrodynamic, spectral,… algorithms to it, what does that say about the patterns in the composition? Possible comparative analyses of the data from these different instruments will hopefully result in beautiful visual textures and patterns that could potentially unlock this data for an audience in a poetic way.

the performance ‘TTT plays FFF/FFF by TTT’ consists of the following compositions:
Why Patterns? (1978) Morton FELDMAN (1926-1987)
Nieuw werk (2025) David FENNESSY (°1976)
For Morton Feldman (2025) Jean-Luc FAFCHAMPS (°1960)

Performed by Het Collectief
Toon Fret, flute
Thomas Dieltjens, piano
Tom De Cock, percussion
Klaas Verpoest, video performance

‘TTT plays FFF/FFF by TTT’ is a coproduction of Kortrijk Festival (B) and New Music Festival Dublin (IRL)
1 April 2025, De Link – Tilburg (NL)
5 or 6 April 2025, New Music Festival Dublin (IRL)
20 May 2025, Tivoli Vredenburg – Utrecht (NL)

Is there life elsewhere in the Universe? How do we detect exoplanets? How do we hope to find life on exoplanets light-years away? What is “TRAPPIST-1”? What do exoplanets tell us about the famous “Fermi’s Paradox”?

The Copernican Revolution taught us that our Earth, far from being the center of the Universe, is only one among the many planets orbiting the Sun, which is itself similar in every respect to the stars lining the celestial vault. Later, astronomy revealed that there are hundreds of billions of stars in the Milky Way, our galaxy, and that there are hundreds of billions of galaxies in our expanding Universe. Faced with such immensity, it is very tempting to hypothesize the existence of other inhabited planets out there, and even of other advanced civilizations. Long confined to speculations, the existence of exoplanets, i.e. planets in orbit around other stars than the Sun, became a proven fact at the end of last century. Since then, more than 4000 exoplanets have been detected at an ever-accelerating pace. A few dozens of these are “potentially habitable”, i.e. they could be rocky worlds harboring oceans of water on their surface, like our Earth. Imagining complex forms of life on some of these planets is but a small step away, one that is happily crossed by science-fiction. But our imagination will eventually be replaced by real scientific measurements, as upcoming giant telescopes will soon be able to probe the atmospheric compositions of some of these extrasolar worlds, and, who knows, to reveal chemical traces of life out there. If so, our view of the Cosmos will change forever…

This concert was performed and recorded on October 24, 2021, Flagey Brussels

Event organized by Science & Cocktails in collaboration with the International Solvay Institutes.

Performers:
Composer: Benjamin Glorieux
Cellists: Benjamin Glorieux, Bryggen String Orchestra
Vincent Caers: electronics
Klaas Verpoest: live video

‘The Solitary One’ is a performative installation transforming the most extreme and paradoxical object that our universe harbours – a black hole – into an immersive audiovisual experience.

Visual artist Klaas Verpoest, sound artist Vincent Caers and cellist-composer Benjamin Glorieux tend to unite art and science in their individual work. A shared fascination for the inexplicable aspects of a black hole and the concepts of space and time led to a joint venture in which they explore the artistic potential of their combined disciplines for illustrating these themes. Along the way they collaborated with theoretical physicist Stéphane Detournay. Their aim is not to provide a scientific explanation, which remains the scientist’s task, but instead to create an immersive installation offering the audience an opportunity for experiencing cosmological phenomena and the incredible forces driving them.

October 23, 2021 – Februari 27, 2022: ‘Cosmos’ Exhibition – CID Grand Hornu, Hornu [B]
October 23, 2021: Opening performance ‘Cosmos’ Exhibition – CID Grand Hornu, Hornu [B]
February 18, 2022: Closing performance ‘Cosmos’ Exhibition – CID Grand Hornu, Hornu [B]
September 8, 2023 – February 4, 2024: Space is the Place exhibition – MUDAC, Lausanne (CH)
December 7, 2023: Space is the Place performance – MUDAC, Lausanne (CH)

Credits:
Vincent Caers: Sound Artist
Benjamin Glorieux: Cellist/Composer
Stéphane Detournay: Scientific Advisor
Klaas Verpoest: Video artist