sam hamilton

The Sex Choir, 2012
Acoustic
Dimensions variable
Price on request

While in the Amazon, Sam Hamilton recorded extraordinary sounds made by frogs. Upon returning to New Zealand he replicated these sounds with a choir of 30 human beings. Echoes of the biological, behavioural and social commonalities between humans and other species can be heard in this choral interpretation.

In a nod to Yves Klein who once exhibited eleven identical artworks each listed with a different price tag, Hamilton offers buyers an option of five different sale prices to choose from. In doing so, the artist questions the valuation of art.

"Sam Hamilton received one of the modest, peer-funded Starving Artist Fund grants organised by artist A.D. Schierning, which paid his way to the Amazon to make field recordings of the sounds of the jungle. It is easy to imagine his encounter with the legendarily vibrant ecosystem having something to do with a shift in his music making that coincided with that trip, away from the sit-down seriousness to something more pop. Euphoric and trance-like aspects of soul, rock and other dance music have been combined with art-music experimentalism in constantly evolving ways since in his work, often striking an exciting balance between complexity and immediacy."

Jon Bywater