Current:
19th March-18th April 2025 -
‘Rhythmanalysis’ at Pusher, London
Text written by Lucy Broom : https://files.cargocollective.com/c688769/Rhythmanalysis-pdf.pdf
“As a child, I used to gaze out of the car window, breathing in the intervals between each time I saw a street light blink past us on the motorway and not breathing out until another lamp came past again. Walking down the street, in and around the city, sometimes we forget to look up. Instead, we stare down at the concrete slabs beneath, searching for patterns in the various constellations of chewing gum stuck to them. One day, I thought about red cars and suddenly saw them everywhere. Though I hadn't seen a red car in months, they suddenly littered the street, throwing themselves in advertisements to me, coming up in conversation, or even taking a street name. I regarded their appearance as a sign from the universe, reinforcing that I was going the right way. The search for patterns is another way to make sense of or measure the world. It has been argued that such a venture is simply frequency illusion, the idea that once you become more aware of something’s existence, you, in turn, have a cognitive bias, facilitating its more frequent perception
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French Marxist philosopher and sociologist Henri Lefebvre, known for his comprehension of everyday life, theorised the concept of Rhythmanalysis. Rhythm is not exclusively related to sound in this context but is more about how one perceives patterns or reads a landscape. Lefebvre noted that a Rhythmanalyst is “capable of listening to a house, a street, a town, as one listens to a symphony, an opera.” Walking through a field might feel shorter than walking the same distance down a crowded metropolitan avenue—the tone and cadence of both vary enormously. ”
photos Jack Elliot Edwards