Music Research Seminar: Sarah Collins (University of Western Australia)
Event abstract
When Jean Baudrillard conceptualised the phenomenon of the 'simulacrum'--the copy or imitation that precedes the original or has no original--it was with an eye to the reproducibility of the image under the conditions of Late Capitalism. This paper will explore an aspect of the pre-history of this phenomenon, focusing on sounding and musical simulacra, in opera and animation. It will explore the operatic and documentary work of German animator Lotte Reiniger and investigate the ways in which it formed a part of an earlier self-aware treatment of aural simulacra that traversed mechanistic and vitalist tendencies during a period of intensified development in labour automation.
About Sarah Collins
Associate Professor Sarah Collins has published widely on the relationship between music aesthetics and political discourse. She is author of Lateness and Modernism: Untimely Ideas about Music, Literature and Politics in Interwar Britain (Cambridge UP, 2019), and The Aesthetic Life of Cyril Scott (Boydell, 2013); editor of Music and Victorian Liberalism: Composing the Liberal Subject (Cambridge UP, 2019); and co-editor with Paul Watt and Michael Allis of The Oxford Handbook of Music and Intellectual Culture in the Nineteenth Century (Oxford UP, 2020). Her research has appeared in the Journal of the Royal Musical Association, Twentieth-Century Music, Music & Letters, Musical Quarterly, and elsewhere. Sarah is Chair of Musicology at the University of Western Australia, Conservatorium of Music, and is currently co-editor of Music & Letters. Read more.
How do I join?
This is a live, interactive session which will be hosted on an online video conferencing platform. To join us, please complete this short form (link embedded). Access details for the session will be emailed to you on the day of the event.
