A duet is a composition for two performers,
pianists playing simultaneously, music to be sung
together, a choreography of hands and voices. Lichens
are a complex duet between a fungus and an alga, separate
organisms in symbiosis. Synthesis could also be described
as a duet in which two elements produce a third.
“Original Synth’ claims a form of being synth or being that which
makes anew. [...] If to synthesise is to make anew, then a
synthesiser represents an ontology defined by the perpetual
production of new combinations.’ Roshanak Kheshti, Wendy Carlos:
Switched-On Bach (33 1/3, Bloomsbury Academic, 2019)
Drawing on the idea of ‘intra-action’ as something where distinct
agencies are entangled, proposed by Karen Barad in Meeting the
Universe Halfway (Duke University Press, 2007), how can we apply
this to materials, forms, space and time in the making of our
work? If we think about the duet as a promise between
two individuals or bodies, what alchemy might be found at
its limits and edges? How porous is this conversation
in duo?