Research and Investigation: Heart Music
October 26–November 8, 2020
Category
  • Screening
Venue

Online
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Program Info

Free
21 & Over

Sponsored by

Major support for Milford Graves: A Mind-Body Deal provided by The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, with additional support from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts and the Joseph Robert Foundation.

Presented by

Milford Graves: A Mind-Body Deal, organized and presented by Ars Nova Workshop and Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania (ICA).

A collection of films chronicling Milford Graves’s study of cardiology. Using a device known as an electronic stethoscope, Graves was able to hear and record the different patterns produced by each heartbeat. Through LabVIEW software, he translated these vibrations into audible frequencies that he called heart music. His research inspired several medical studies, including a collaboration with researcher Carlo Ventura which showed that exposure to heart music caused unassigned stem cells to develop into myocardial cells.


Cover: Milford Graves. in the laboratory. Image courtesy of the artist.