Motor-Stick (EMS / Vstix)

The Motor-Stick uses a small DC motor with a counterbalance attached to a stick, cooking chopstick or flexible rod. While in operation, the device oscillates the attached stick and allows it to produce complex orbital paths, striking an object or surface and propelling the stick to the next object. Over time, distinctive rhythms and textures emerge, sitting outside the framework of traditionally conceived musical sounds — a new kind of gestural sound produced by direct acoustic synthesis rather than the musique concrète or digital technique of distorting recorded sound.

“Initially Alexander Calder tried using motors in his works, but abandoned this method. That inspired me to attempt using my Vstix mechanisms to influence a mobile kinetically.” — Avenaim

Vstix 360° — Ballet Aveugle: Pas De Six / Study #4 (2019), for 2 suspended EMS devices mounted on a mobile and six violins. Constructed as part of Jon Rose’s “The Violin Generator.”

Vstix 360° — Mobile Study #3 (2018), for 2 EMS devices with bamboo segments, suspended by a cascading mobile sculpture. Featured at Testing Grounds, Melbourne. Suspension and multiple Vstix mechanisms was the concept for this work: “Having 2 Vstix sticks finally assisted the mobile to move rapidly in circles. This was one of my visions when first building the Vstix mobile. Suspending all the objects gave the entire sculpture zero friction, allowing the Vstix sticks to act as a type of force — like wind — to propel the mobile in a direction continually.”

EMS – Vstix 360° — Study #2 (2011–12), for 1 suspended EMS device and multiple percussion objects as a resonant terrain. Featured at “Motorgenic,” a retrospective exhibition of Vstix devices built between 2003–2016, at The Substation, Melbourne, 17 November – 17 December 2016.

Modifications to the original Vstix 180° device introduced a longer, flexible stick able to rotate a full 360° and react with more volatility to the percussive environment laid out underneath. With updated technical characteristics came more opportunities to compose spatially, giving rise to new, untapped sonic qualities in terms of tempo, rhythm, variety of sounds and dynamics.

Vstix 360° — Mobile Study #1 (2016), for 1 EMS, acoustic cymbal and percussion resonant terrain.