French electronic group Air have given a new track to the forthcoming short film by Chinese visual artist Yi Zhou.
Air formed in the mid 90s, and became one of the foremost groups in a new wave of chilled out French dance music. The duo released their debut album ‘Premiers Symptomes’ in 1997, with their second album ‘Moon Safari’ becoming an international success.
Spawning the singles ‘Kelly Watch The Stars’ and ‘Sexy Boy’ the album was hugely acclaimed, as a new wave of Gallic cool swept across the globe. Since then, the band have enjoyed varying degrees of success with their last studio album ‘Pocket Symphony’ being released in 2007.
Since then, the band have taken time off with an expanded version of ‘Moon Safari’ being released last year. Air have been working on new material, with a previously unheard song set to be used as a soundtrack for a new short film.
Air have given new track ‘The Dream Of Yi’ to visual artist Yi Zhou. Zhou is responsible for the new film ‘Hear, Earth, Heart’ which debuted last year, and is set to be shown as part of Art Basel, the modern art extravaganza running in Basel, Switzerland.
According to a blog on Air’s MySpace page, the film will be projected onto a marble plate. Another film by Yi Zhou ‘My Heart Laid Bare’ uses music by Chester French, and will also be shown at the Basel event.
Yi Zhou is a celebrated Chinese artist, who creates large-scale multi-media installations artworks that blend a vast array of disciplines. Multi-award winning, Zhou’s work mixes ancient expressive methods with modern techniques.
Air, of course, are no strangers to soundtrack work. The band scored Sophia Coppolla’s film ‘The Virgin Suicides’ which introduced some darker elements to their sound. Acclaimed by critics, the album spawned the international hit single ‘Playground Love’.
The duo later teamed up with Coppola again, supplying a track for the soundtrack to her film ‘Marie Antoinette’. In addition to this the band’s drummer Brian Reitzell organised the soundtrack to ‘Lost In Translation’ which included a song by Air.
Art Basel takes place in Basel, Switzerland between June 10th – 14th.
