Taykú

About the work

Taykú (2024) is a stereo electroacoustic composition performed through a quadraphonic setup. It was first presented at GAK Bremen during nearly all types of honey crystallize, an exhibition of the HfK Bremen Binational Artistic PhD Programme.

During a visit to Kággaba territory, Rosales Fonseca filmed Windúa, a sacred mountain near the entrance to Teykú. A barbed-wire fence dividing the landscape caught his attention. The image brought into focus a tension between the familiar portrayal of the Kággaba as guardians of the Sierra and their ongoing struggles to access and care for their territory. The work retains the title Taykú, as he initially heard the name, before later learning that the place is called Teykú.

Field recordings made during the day and night bring frogs, birds, insects, and everyday sounds into the composition, alongside voices whose words remain difficult to distinguish. This was also Rosales Fonseca’s first compositional encounter with Konrad Theodor Preuss’s historical phonographic recordings, from which he used fragments of the collector’s voice rather than recordings of Kággaba songs.

During the live performance, the image of Windúa returns within a darkened space, where the composer’s body, movements, and shadows interfere with the projected landscape. Improvisations with a self-built instrument of cotton threads and knots unfold alongside written instructions concerned with caring for the land. Through these interactions, Taykú brings into the performance the tensions that began to emerge during Rosales Fonseca’s encounters with the territory, including the distance between what he could experience, what he could represent, and what remained beyond his understanding.