Costa Rica AD 800-1200
sculptural folded up fluteby the artist
Bahia, Ecuador, 400 BC-400 AD
Through her years of research, Ms. Rawcliffe has become an authority on construction methods of ceramic wind instruments both contemporary and those of Pre-Hispanic artists. Initial research in Mexico was sponsored in part by a NEA grant. She has had the privilege of playing and examining the instruments of the ancient Americas in collections throughout the USA and Mexico.
For 30 centuries, the Pre-Hispanic societies from the Olmecs to the Mayas, Zapotecs and Aztecs developed a unique flute organology. Their instruments were created for spiritual devotions and are redolent with ceremonial symbolism. Ms. Rawcliffe's research is circular: she makes acoustical copies, learns to play them, then reinvests her insights, evolving through stages into new instruments, which inspire with their wonderful scales and evocative timbres. These studies teach her the craft of building musical instruments and point to the art of how sound affects people.
The marvelous ancient flutes, pipes, ocarinas and whistles were made in a wide diversity of shapes and sounds, including ones unique to these societies. They are not so much the "remains of a bygone art, as the sacred sound symbols of a now vanished cult." Through her work, Ms. Rawcliffe is able to play sounds that may not have been heard for 1000 years. It's her pleasure to share them with others.
Ms. Rawcliffe can bring to a lecture a wide range of slides of Pre-Hispanic musical instruments, as well as slides of her own work. As part of a presentation, she plays her flute, pipes, ocarinas, whistles and trumpets, sharing their wonderful sounds and musical potential, drawing parallels between her own and the ancient instruments. She can focus exclusively on the work of the Aboriginal flute makers or on ceramic flutes in general, discuss instrument construction practices, visual possibilities and explore musical issues.
Ms. Rawcliffe's current article, "Sounding Clay: Pre-Hispanic Flutes" will be published in June 2002 by the International Study Group on Musical Archaeology, Hannover, Germany. In September, 2000, she lectured and performed at the Symposium "The Archaeology of Early Sound, Origins and Organization," at Kloster Michaelstein in Germany. Ms. Rawcliffe has also lectured for: the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences, the Smithsonian Institute; the Metropolitan Museum; and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Her article, "Complex Acoustics in Pre-Columbian Flute Systems" was published in 1992 by the Smithsonian Press in the textbook Musical Repercussions of 1492, in Experimental Musical Instruments Vol. VIII #2, and in the National Council on Education in the Ceramic Arts Journal Vol. 14, 1993-4. "Harmonic Combinations", an article on her work, was featured in the October 1997 issue of Ceramics Monthly. Additional articles include "The Flutes and Sound Sculptures of Susan Rawcliffe," Experimental Musical Instruments, Vol. 11, #2 and cassette #XII; and Music Works #55, "Jolted Awake: New Sounds from Ancient Instruments, Pre-Columbian Winds," by Susan Rawcliffe, with CD or cassette.