Gibigiana is a word of Milanese origin used to describe sunlight reflected by a surface of glass, mirror, or water. When water serves as the reflective surface, such light takes on an animated quality. The word is likewise used to indicate a woman who shows off a flashy attempt at elegance. Though perhaps used derogatorily, the project celebrates the exhibition of worth and the desire to be seen, countering attempts to render the female invisible. Generating visibility by exploiting the nature of invisibility therefore informs these investigations.

Olivier Messiaen wrote Fête des belles eaux to be performed along the Seine, accompanied by the movement of water through the fountains of the 1937 Paris Exposition. This hydraulic spectacle combined technological innovation with visual impact. This installation likewise celebrates technology and aesthetic fantasy by evoking “dreams of liquid life.”

The central forecourt fountain of the American Academy in Rome is a passive part of the compositional order of the McKim, Mead & White building: a pleasant but easily overlooked aspect of the entry sequence, despite the fact that visitors must walk around it to access the main entry stairs.

Through light and water effects, we attempted to make the fountain more visible through the performance of the Ondes Martenot and the bodies of its players. Surrounded by a translucent shroud, the fountain was screened from visibility behind the encircling performers, whose movement was registered on the surface of the water by a light object suspended over the top of the veil. Using high-intensity light, that registration and the water’s liquid life were made manifest through reflection.

Because the piece has an array of different characters, the registration of bodily movement over the water’s surface creates distinct aqueous responses, providing visual diversity throughout the performance. The individuality of these responses is likewise linked to the idea of “water memory”—suggesting that water “notes” the external influences that have acted upon it—with each body asserting its own force, as an expression of its own lifetime of memory, while interacting with the bodily forces of the other performers to make an imprint on the fountain’s surface.

Funding from the Fromm Music Foundation, The Aaron Copland Fund for Music, Inc., and the American Academy in Rome Fellows’ Project Fund.