Noise Bodies
https://www.dropbox.com/s/2dlahu59ia08pmp/
The exhibition’s title, Noise Bodies, is a tribute to artist Carolee Schneemann and composer James Tenney’s eponymous 1965 performance work – one of Schneemann’s co-minglings, “works combining object making with movement, sound and participatory experience ”. Performed by the two collaborators themselves in “wearable sculptures” consisting of domestic objects to be sounded such as “refrigerator tubes, ice trays, carburettor vents” – currently on display in Schneemann’s Barbican retrospective – Noise Bodies produced what Schneemann termed an “own body sound system”. This exhibition expands this notion of ‘co-mingling’ to include the coming together of the works of the 18 graduating sound artists, touching on multiple questions of embodiment, human and otherwise, and their entanglement.
Sarah Birchall’s ‘Listen as I Have Listened’, through diary entries, drawings, photography and audio recordings, sublimates a personal relationship with Dilston Gallery, inviting the visitor to locations where the building has spoken to the artist. Toby Boston’s ‘Sky Father, Earth Mother’ explores our relationship with the planets through a multichannel audio-visual composition. Wenyu Du’s ‘They Know We’re Listening’ comprises an array of ‘listening pillows’, each fed by a microphone located elsewhere in the exhibition space, playing with the self-surveillance that gallery visitors tend to impose on their own voice. Jiajing He’s ‘Listen, Be Aware, Meditate’, adheres to a process of Pauline Oliveros-inspired Deep Listening in the creating of a new instrument, presented here itself, alongside the album of recordings it has generated and a processual video document. Xiuling He’s sound installation consists of a composition that works with field recordings played across an array of speaker cones whose sonic vibrations in turn, through reflective material, produce light reflections and shadow, exploring the relationship between what we experience and what is truly present. Timotej Kuhar Cernej’s interrogation of ‘sonic branding’ and identity formation is presented here through the invitation to the visitor to climb inside his felt sculpture. Maria Marshall’s ‘Warping the Weft / Wefting the Warp’ introduces a large-scale loom hanging from the ceiling and sounded out by the connected speakers during the weaving process, creating a bond between the electronic elements and acoustic surroundings. Xin Ni’s mixed media installation, ‘Debris Tells’ invites visitors to play with two hourglass instruments that feed into a compositional layer that meditates on the connections between accelerated cycles of waste and noise pollution. Mike Olliston’s installation orbits around sounds mixed from the audio files (mp3s, voicemail, etc) from second-hand hard drives readily available on eBay. Xinyu Pan presents new scores that play with text and graphics generated from AI analysis of works from other sound artists; each in turn presented here with a recording of its performance by colleagues and friends. Finbar Prior employs the form of enlarged drumheads with reflective mylar ‘skins’ to build his own giant microphones, here in the gallery used in turn to play back their own recordings. Beth Robertson’s‘Con-crete’ explores the testimonies of the more-than-human here in a building over 110 years old, inviting the visitor to pick up one of a bank of telephones with the quiet anticipation of a voice, of someone at the other end of the line. Elliot Somerfield’s composition and readymade sculpture explore the profuse and constant sounds made by the human mouth in excess of speech and follow the experience of double jaw surgery. Minne Sun experiments with the experience of a trip to Paris, capturing unconscious sounds in a microcosm of the larger journey of life. Shiyu Tan’s ‘Autumn/一叶知秋’ foreground our every action and its cyclical relation with its environment to ask, did you really listen carefully, is there something out there in the universe that can speak or even shout to us without us noticing? Andy Trewren’s ‘Public Mode’ explores different registers of participation and their interrelation through two interactive audio sculptures that are further activated in live dance performances with The Follow Through Collective. Keisuke Tsuchiya imagines a future acoustic ecology where humans parasitically wear giant fish-heads as extended organs through which to listen and breathe, presenting ceramic sculpture, drawings and live performance. Naifu Zhang invites visitors to use their voices to activate an audio visualisation based on the artist’s vivid imaginings.
I don’t think there is a specific relationship between the exhibition ‘noise bodies’ and the topic on my audio paper but I went to the opening day. I am very interested in the performative ideas people would like to bring about on ‘noise bodies’. What is noise body? Are you defining your body as a noisy instrument? I always find disgusting when I hear indigestion of my tummy and as well, I hate the sound I eating food.
Critical thinking on people’s performance on the opening day: The second one was about the connection of body joints and robotic sound installations. I was thinking if there was physical connection (electric sensitivity control in the installation), but there were not. So it was more about the dancers were following the led light cubes of the objects. It was good but I found the music behind was a bit boring.
The third one was my favourite one talking about how the sounds were getting distorted and more vague by using mouth blowing in the ceramic installations. I was amazed by how the artist could build so many of them and each of them were in a very huge size. I loved that one for domestic reason as well, cause it was really in the format of Buddhism and Taoism, like the word 修行 in Chinese. I discussed with him on how he made it with mud cause it was really mysterious. He put condensed mic and blue tooth speakers in each of these and connected them with an Arduino board. For the sake of the place, the effect was not really great, but I do loved it. And I appreciated for his hard work as well.
The fourth one was Jin’s hand made synth in a performance. It performed very well and I could know the bgm was pre made in several channels I believe. I think that’s why I really wanted to make the first part of my audio paper in 8 channels. It was a long experimental and instrumental ambient piece but mix of electronic textures, well done.
I am not very happy with the fifth and sixth one as I am a bit confused with the idea they would like to demonstrate. The fifth one was interesting and the idea was like a sewing machine that you could see the connection between the society as the connection between the physical lines. The final one was a bit boring as it was sound for screen and applying basic knowledge of unity or TD, I won’t know.