The Night Journey is based on an Indian miniature painting in the Asian Art Museum collection, The night journey of the Prophet Muhammad on the heavenly creature Buraq (c. 1800). Mirza has converted a pixelated version of this image into a score, or source code, for his custom-built media system. Visitors enter a darkened room, where they are surrounded by vintage speakers that “play” the score as electrical sounds — buzzing, humming, droning, hissing — and corresponding colored LED lights.
By translating an artwork into a score and the score into electrical impulses in the form of sound, light and color, Mirza allows us to hear, see and even feel art in new ways, raising larger questions about our perceptions of the world around us.
Image: Haroon Mirza: A C I D G E S T, Pérez Art Museum Miami, 2017–2018. Photograph by Oriol Tarridas.
Haroon Mirza: The Night Journey is organized by the Asian Art Museum. Presentation is made possible with the generous support of The Akiko Yamazaki and Jerry Yang Fund for Excellence in Exhibitions and Presentations, Cori and Tony Bates, Ken and Ruth Wilcox, and an anonymous donor.
