Music’s Incited ‘Augmented Reality’ in Xenakis’s Polytopes, Scriabin’s Mysterium and Polymediality

Abstract

The Polytopes by Iannis Xenakis is the collective name of a series of spatial multimedia installations and musical land art pieces realised on the second half of the 20th century, which take part in the tradition that links Richard Wagner’s conception of the total art work, the Gesamtkunstwerk. In the first decade of the same century, Alexander Scriabin envisioned his interpretation of a total art work, the utopian multimedia and multisensorial symphony Mysterium. By providing a brief description of the Concept of Polymediality (2003) and representative compositions associated with its two dimensions, this paper forms the hypothesis that all aforementioned works come under the contemporary notion of ‘augmented reality’. This is understood within a hybrid and polyaesthetic context, in which the composer defines a spatial unity of all media elements interacting with the music.