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    Iannis Xenakis – Le Diatope Program

    December 1st, 2017

    Iannis Xenakis, Le Diatope program.
    The cover of Iannis Xenakis’ Le Diatope program, circa late 1970s.

    Here we have a few visual treats from a program published on the occasion of avant-garde Greek composer Iannis Xenakis’ Le Diatope, a spectacle of architecture, light and sound to celebrate the opening of The Pompou Center in Paris in 1978. “Made of red vinyl stretched over a metal frame, the Diatope’s curvilinear form recalls the famous Philips Pavilion designed by Xenakis and Le Corbusier for the Brussels World Fair in 1958, which housed the Poème Electronique of Edgard Varèse. Indeed, the immersive multimedia plan of the Philips Pavilion was the model for a number of later works Xenakis called Polytopes. He created four of these prior to the Diatope: the Polytope de Montreal in 1967, an open-air spectacle in Persepolis in 1971, and two Polytopes in the Parisian Abby of Cluny in 1972 and 1973. Inside the Diatope, Xenakis arranged a light show involving 1600 flashbulbs and four lasers guided by four hundred adjustable mirrors. Both abstract and representational figures were meticulously choreographed and traced by light. Xenakis’ sketches for the light show mention shapes such as lotuses, galaxies and wheels.”–Socks Studio

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