Canberra International Music Festival: Shock Lines

This year we were delighted to be part of the backbone of an incredible collaborative work of art by artists from very different skillsets.

When we first were contacted about the concept we remembered Mark Applebaum and his journey into how he described it: making music 'interesting'.

When we think of music, we usually think in terms of instruments we are often familiar with, ones which have been evolving, but are somewhat well known, like a piano, a guitar, synthesiser, drums.

But what about instruments we craft from alternative materials?

What if we crafted instruments.... from glass?

Shock Lines is an interdisciplinary collaboration between glass artist Caitlin Dubler, Canberra-born percussionist Niki Johnson, and sound designer Natasha Dubler that works across installation, performance and musical composition. Their self-titled work features suspended glass-sandstone sculptures, live percussive performance, and immersive surround sound. 

Shock Lines is a site-specific journey through Canberra’s Glassworks and a deep dive into the world of glass music. It also features excerpts seminal works for glass instruments by Mozart, Annea Lockwood, Ros Bandt and Eugene Ughetti.

Source: CIMF

We went behind the scenes for a first hand view of what it takes to create the piece we heard and saw performed at Canberra and asked the artists the important questions:

This is so unique and interesting - what in the world inspired you all to create this?

Thanks so much! Shock Lines came together in a really organic way—it’s been a beautiful convergence of our individual practices. We all have an interest in experimental processes and ideas of material transformation, which I suppose is the foundation of this project.

Like many others in 2021–22, we were each searching for a new collaborative project to really sink our teeth into. I (Natasha) had met Niki a few years earlier through music teaching and we’d often discussed working together, though we didn’t yet know what form that might take. At the time Niki was looking for sculptors to collaborate with on a performance project and I knew my sister, Caitlin, would be interested.

The next question was, of course, would the glass sound at all interesting?!

How did you go about creating the glass pieces?

Caitlin here to explain the glass… I make the glass pieces by fusing fine glass particles (called frit) and ground sandstone in a kiln. This is a very experimental process as the two materials react to each other in unpredictable ways.

The glass is heated to 810C, making it liquid like thick honey. The glass particles congeal and pool together while the sandstone breaks the surface tension of the glass, revealing deeply textured and gritty surfaces. The sandstone particles fuse inside the glass and erode over time. The natural iron oxides in the sandstone tint from white to an orange-pink colour. Making the work at Canberra Glassworks through their Artist in Residence program meant I could experiment on a larger scale.

Kiln forming is an interesting technique, as I can’t directly touch the glass like you would with glassblowing or other hands-on craft processes. It is always very exciting to open a kiln and see what has happened - you can never entirely predict it!

Working with sound has changed the traditional ‘rules’ of glassmaking where a glass artist usually wants control of the outcome. We found that the more variable the glass forms are, the more complex the sounds are. This means having less control in the firing process and letting the natural reactions between the glass, sandstone, and kiln take over.

How long does each piece usually take to craft? What process does it go through?

Each piece needs to go in the kiln 2-3 times: once to fuse the glass into a thin sheet, and two more times to slowly shape the glass over moulds and armatures (called slumping). Each firing takes two days as the glass needs to be slowly heated and cooled, allowing the molecules to rearrange and settle. Two days is actually fast for kiln forming! Depending on how thick it is, glass pieces might need to be in the kiln for weeks at a time.

How do you then select it's role in what appears to be a tonal and also percussive performance?

Glass is such an intriguing material for sound—still largely unexplored in musical contexts. One of the first things we discovered as Caitlin began creating pieces for performance was just how unpredictable the sound of each sculpture could be. Tiny changes in form or surface thickness can completely alter pitch and timbre.

Photo: Brenton McGeachie

What’s more, every piece of glass she makes holds multiple, complex tones. So, experimentation quickly became a cornerstone of our process—which suits us perfectly. For performance, we prioritise variability to give us the broadest possible sound palette. The glass is, of course, pitched, and resonant, but it can also be sharp, textured, gritty, or blooming. Some pieces have a strong attack; others unfold more slowly. What fascinates us most is how the sound evolves as it resonates—there’s always something surprising, and that makes it unlike any other instrument.

How did you come up with performable pieces of music?

All of our performance works are composed collaboratively by Niki and Natasha, using live glass percussion and electronics built from sampled recordings of Caitlin’s glass sculptures.

We usually work in long studio sessions—improvising, responding to one another, slowly shaping the musical material until something cohesive starts to take form. From there, we refine and tweak as we would with any other composition.

That said, the process comes with a unique challenge: the fragility of glass. It’s easy to get attached to the sound of a particular piece or build an entire composition around a specific object — only to have it break. It can be heartbreaking.

What role did Silent Rave Headphones and our transmission system play in how you presented to your audience and what difference did that make for you?

For our recent performances at Canberra Glassworks, we created a site-specific soundwalk using the Silent Rave Headphones. The idea was to let audiences explore the building freely — including the hotshop, where the glassblowers work—without industrial noise interfering with the listening experience.

We wanted something intuitive for audiences but that also offered a high-quality sound experience. The headphones were absolutely perfect. Feedback was overwhelmingly positive, and surprisingly, the signal worked flawlessly throughout the 100+ year-old brick building — even in the lift!

Do you have any ideas as to how you may expand this performance in the future?

Always! We’re constantly dreaming up ways to scale this up and explore new possibilities. You’ll have to stay tuned to see where we take it next!

We at The Silent Rave are always looking for opportunity to take part in art exhibits a little differently and get amazing results and look forward to the ways Niki Caitlin and Natasha develop further on this amazing art!