The Most Beautiful World in the World
I have always thought of the making art as a world building exercise. Each new plastic vision a photograph offers is constructed from what is already there; we just couldn’t see it before. Walter Benjamin called this the “optical unconscious.” Of course, he was making a complicated argument how the distracted state one finds oneself in the cinema primes one for the absorption of political messages. It’s a kind of riff on the gesture of art seducing the viewer into contemplating unpleasant truths. I believe in that. I also believe in the special type of open invitations art creates to enter deeper modes of contemplation about who we are and how we would like to live. Like portals, pictures give us entry into new worlds contained within the pedestrian world we trod in on the daily.
This week’s picture for me is that kind of portal. A feather on the beach that contains a rainbow; a spectrum created by the rearrangement of symbols (code) of light captured in another image made on the same beach. This image is from my show that just came down from the Galveston Art Center, entitled Slow Bell.
The audio is the first track from a soundscape that played in the exhibition. I recorded the guitar on the beach and then layered the recording at home with field recordings from Galveston, lap steel, bass synth, and piano.
Dan Schmahl from Rising Tide Projects based in Galveston did an amazing job printing up an O-Card for the (inevitable) cassette and accompanying 16-page full-color book on the Riso, shown below filmed on the beach with the help of Paul Stautinger.
This week’s picture for me is that kind of portal. A feather on the beach that contains a rainbow; a spectrum created by the rearrangement of symbols (code) of light captured in another image made on the same beach. This image is from my show that just came down from the Galveston Art Center, entitled Slow Bell.
The audio is the first track from a soundscape that played in the exhibition. I recorded the guitar on the beach and then layered the recording at home with field recordings from Galveston, lap steel, bass synth, and piano.
Dan Schmahl from Rising Tide Projects based in Galveston did an amazing job printing up an O-Card for the (inevitable) cassette and accompanying 16-page full-color book on the Riso, shown below filmed on the beach with the help of Paul Stautinger.
︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵
WHERE TO GET THE BOOK AND CASSETTE
1. Stream tracks for free here.2. Your favorite streaming services (except if your fav is Spotify, which should be nobody’s favorite at this point) should have it up by the time this gets posted, but for sure by 2.15.2026.
3. Get the cassette by itself (or bundled with the book) and/or download on Bandcamp.
4. Get the book by itself (or with the cassette in a bundle) on Metalabel. You get free downloads if you buy the book or the bundle and can even just download the files there too.
5. Buy the book in Galveston or at the Dallas Art Fair later this spring from Rising Tide Projects .
︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵
UPCOMING PSO EVENTS
Book Event + Performance Saturday, February 28, 6-8 pm, with a live performance at 7pm, Do Right Hall. Brought to you by the fine folks that run WRONG GALLERY in Marfa, Texas. Book your trip. Jason Reed and I will driving out west to stretch out our 58-foot accordion-fold book, BOOM AND DUST, in the gorg space built in 1886 that was the first church of Marfa. It is an all adobe structure. It’s super cool and the ideal place to reprise the soundtrack that PSO recorded for the book live.︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵
LETS'S MAKE SOMETHING TOGETHER
I love to collaborate, remotely or in person, but if you have a piece you would like to feature on PSO (without contributions by me), by all means, please reach out!Email us at info(at)porchswingorchestra.org
︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵
ABOUT PSO
Porch Swing Orchestra is an art project begun by Barry Stone that explores the interplay between still images and sound.Photographs and musical improvisations build a framework for deep listening and visual contemplation. Barry Stone plays acoustic guitar with a Fahey-inspired picking style mixed in with electronic effects, like My Bloody Valentine for a campfire. The sounds of the outside—bird calls, stray conversations, passing cars—become part of the music.
Stone scrambles the code and layers images taken on-site to produce new imaginaries. We discover fresh ways to see and hear everything.
Since 2018, PSO has collaborated with dozens of musicians, artists, poets, writers, and activists to publish over 240 unique combinations of images and sounds.
Most PSO pieces are made on Stone’s front porch in Austin, Texas, but PSO has traveled to Spiral Jetty in Utah, the border town of Del Rio, Texas, Maine, the San Juan Islands, and performes live in unconventional venues such as the James Turrell Skyspace, The Color Inside as a part of The University of Texas Landmarks Songs in the Skyspace Program.
Each new piece displaces the last and is not archived on the site. Never miss a piece or performance by signing up for our FREE NEWSLETTER below.
To experience selected past pieces, listen to the PSO RADIO, or tune into our PODCAST, or stream us on SPOTIFY in the links below.
Releases can be purchased on BANDCAMP or at BARRYSTONE.COM
︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵
PSO JUKEBOX
Listen and view a stream of randomly selected past PSO pieces!
Exclusively here at PSO HQ.
Click on the PSO JUKEBOX Icon to Start the Stream
Exclusively here at PSO HQ.
Click on the PSO JUKEBOX Icon to Start the Stream
︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵
LISTEN TO THE PSO PODCAST
︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵
Orchestra Players:
Gregory Brooks, Bob Warner, Emily Scarlet Kramer, Rainey Knudson, Ryan Lauderdale, Tamara Gonzales, Katy Chrisler, Gibson + Recoder, Paul Stautinger, Sarah Hennies, Eric Zimmerman, Matt Bauer, Sandy Carson, Ryan Rhodes, Rebecca Marino, Shannon Spurgeon, Aaron Winslow, Ivy Stone, Mark Menjivar, Gavin Watts, Ryan Sprott, Brad Tucker, Caleb Churchill, John Hunt, Audra Wolowiec, Lauren Grant, Bill McCullough, Henry Smith, Anthony Francis, Xavier Gilmore, Ana Treviño, Ariana Gomez, Jessica Mallios, Thomas Hooper, SKLOSS, The Reformers, Zuriel Waters, Joe Williams, Jason Reed, Adam Henry, Saumon Oboudiyat
︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵