Jovino Santos Neto – Plex.us acknowledgements

I am very grateful to everyone who has made this project a reality. First and foremost, my artistic partner in Plex.us, Michelle de la Vega. It has been a joy collaborating with her throughout the whole process. We were in total synchrony of ideas, from the initial concepts to the final stages of fabrication and installation. I wish every artistic partnership would be this easy.

Irene Gomez, Miguel Guillén and the whole team at La Sala for initiating the idea that connected me to Michelle and for coordinating the complex logistics of the grants that allowed us to do this.

Many thanks to my wife Luzia Grob dos Santos, who was involved in documenting each stage of the project and in providing essential aesthetic advice.

Very special thanks to Kyong Soh from Marra Farm, for introducing me to so many people from the South Park community who let me record their voices. Kyong was always very open and receptive, and because of her, the human sounds of South Park, along with other environmental sonorities (water, wind, airplanes, cars) became the core of the whole musical component of Plex.us.

Thanks to James Rasmussen from the Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition for his inspiring talk to the community at Marra Farm back in June, from which I extracted many samples of sounds for my music tracks.

Also, special thanks go to Ruby Fontillea, Education & Leadership Coordinator at Concord International School. It was a pleasure to work with their young students and to share musical ideas with them. I was touched by their celebration of Brazilian culture in my honor. 

Special thanks to Cornish students Thomas Reyna, who played some beautiful flute sounds, and to Will Smith, who designed the hardware and software foundation for the music setup in the CoCA Gallery space. 

Thanks to Nichole DeMent and all the staff at CoCA for giving Plex.us a home where it will live for several weeks.

What I tried to do here was to translate the multicultural landscape of South Park into music. I was inspired by the many languages spoken in this neighborhood, and also by the sounds of the Duwamish River, the airplanes flying overhead, the industries. I added piano, keyboards, flutes, and lots of sound textures to create the music that is embedded inside Michelle’s delicate and powerful sculptures. I hope that this installation will inspire everyone to listen more closely to his or her surroundings and to be more aware of the environment we live in.