Collective is pleased to present a new performance on Calton Hill by Cauleen Smith on 28 April at 7pm, commissioned as part of the current exhibition of her 2014 film H-E-L-L-O in our City Dome. The event is free and there is no need to book.

Cauleen will produce a public performance of the five-note sequence composed by John Williams. Working with Collective’s unique landscape, architecture and backdrop, the performance will take place across Calton Hill and will feature five locally based musicians playing the score as a call and response on their bass clef instruments.

Cauleen Smith is an interdisciplinary artist whose work reflects upon the everyday possibilities of the imagination. She believes in the transformative power of art, music and text, and employs radical thought as a tool in her work to envision a better world.

H-E-L-L-O signals a search for connection in a time of uncertainty and unrest, bringing together themes of historic erasure, presence and loss. Performed in a series of significant cultural and public spaces in New Orleans during the regeneration of the city post Hurricane Katrina, H-E-L-L-O re-interprets the famous five-note musical motif from Stephen Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind. With this five-note sequence, the artist signals a desire for connection across boundaries and borders, real and imagined. The performance will create an opportunity for art and music to be rooted in these discussions and in Calton Hill as a site with a long history of cultural and political gatherings.

Earlier in the week on 26 April from 2—5pm, Cauleen will also take part in Collective’s Shifting Tactics workshop series, leading an in-person screening and discussion around the creative potential of improvisation in film making.

The event is now fully booked, however you can join the waiting list by emailing [email protected].

Lastly, on 26 April at 7pm, Collective will host Cauleen Smith in Conversation with artist and producer Emmie McLuskey. Part talk, part listening session, the event will focus on the artist’s love of music and how she has worked with sound in her films.

Book your free space here.