Pablo's Eye

A temporary atmosphere

Pablo's Eye describes itself as not a band but a temporary atmosphere, like a taste, like a dream. Resident Advisor calls it an experimental music and art collective formed in Brussels in 1989 with no fixed line-up, headed by its founding producer Axel Libeert. Per the band's About page it began as a flexible project in which additional members were always welcome, and its large cross-media collaborations have involved architecture, video, theatre and dance. Libeert, 63 in 2019, started directing studies at RITCS at 18, composed television credits, lived in London for six years working for CBS and ZTT, remixed for Colin Newman of Wire and toured France with Front 242, and ended his career quietly around 2000, per BRUZZ.

In the 1990s they released on Swim~, the label of Newman and Malka Spigel, and the Australian label Extreme: Barcelona, Architects Of (1991), Devotions (1992), You Love Chinese Food (1995), Prepare for the Others to Follow (1996), They Had No Other Alternative but to Destroy Her (1997) and All She Wants Grows Blue (dated 1998 by the band and 1999 by the Wire newsletter), with Realismo in 1999 in a limited edition with Vaughan Oliver's V23 design team. After a hiatus came southlite (2017, recorded 1999, from a story by Richard Skinner) and STROOM's anthologies Spring Break (April 16, 2018), Bardo for Pablo (July 2, 2018; Pitchfork reviewed it, 8.2 per BRUZZ) and Dark Matter (January 21, 2019). Libeert said the crowd's reaction to "Opina" at his Tate Modern set led him to revive the project: only because he was able to elicit that emotion again.

They played Tate Modern in May 2018, Les Brigittines in Brussels on April 19, 2019, Kaiku in Helsinki, and the Berlin Atonal main stage on August 31, 2019. A mountain is an idea followed on The Florist's Mum on March 11, 2022, their first original album in over two decades, then The light was sharp, our eyes were open (June 4, 2024) and Everything you give away on STROOM in August 2026.