VINST is a video installation and interactive sound performance enabling real-time control of both sonic and visual representation of my voice – thus creating an extraordinary fusion of human body sound and video.

VINST is a highly sensitive vocal instrument consisting of my body image displaying points of sonic sensitivity that can be played by all. Applied pressure (gentle or hard, continuous or staccato) via a pressure sensitive pen, triggers appropriate sonic and bodily reactions and various real time sound and video effects.
The sounds are pre- or non- linguistic, and are based on how the body reacts to touch and how it produces sound. If you touch VINST body lightly, you get pure tones. If you press a bit more, you are tickling and get laughing; if you prod even more, you generate pain, but there are pleasurable sounds too.
This vocabulary of around 50 sounds is in evolution, as is its accompanying system of annotation.

Performing VINST can be an intimate, moving, cathartic, playful and sensual experience as my instrumental body responds to touch, but also to mood and sensibility (mine and yours).
I personally derive as much pleasure playing (with) my virtual self as from watching others doing so.
Long live VINST

Programmed in MAX/MSP and JITTERS by Sebastian Lexer.

Developed with financial support from London Arts R&D Combined Arts fund and Surrey Institute of Art and Design research fund.

Vinst 2 Video Demo

Vinst 3 Video test

The story so far

Birth of VINST 1 – performance lecture – took place on the 20th of November 2004 at Toynbee studios, London (part of Performance; strategy and process, a series of events around Adrian Piper’s exhibition and talk, curated by Adelaide Bannerman).

Birth of VINST II took place on the 3rd March 2005 in the Music department, of Metropolitan University, London

Birth of VINST III took place for trampoline platform for media art Broadway cinema, December 2005 Nottingham

Birth of VINST IV took place for MINDPLAY conference at Metropolitan University London, Jan 06

VINST installation – part of EXPO966 Sonic art network annual festival in June 2005 in Scarborough.

Part of LSO St Luke’s community festival , London July 2005

Part of my exhibition at Lagerhaus Neufelden in Austria in April/May 2006
Part of the Singer and the Song event at Theatre museum iCovent Garden, London in September 2006 .

VINST1 (or Vinstenstein as I like to call it) appears in Performance Research volume 9 no. 2, June 2004, “on the page“ issue.
VINST first utterances appear in the current issue (spring 2005) of How2 internet contemporary creative writing magazine (multimedia section).

VINST project features on www.soundtoys.net since April 2005

Also see...