25 Apr 2018, Wed 07:30 PM - 09:00 PM
Block 43 Malan Road
Ever since sound entered the space of art, it has been plotting its escape. Materially, sound is difficult to contain. It leaks through walls, resounds in unruly ways, is audible where it should be not. This excessiveness, or “noisiness,” is a fundamental quality of sound. Conceptually, sound is equally slippery. Attempts to define it always seem delimited and constraining, insufficient when set against the infinite horizon of the sonic imaginary. Sound is materially and conceptually resistant—it always contains too much. So, against this sense of “too much sound,” what specialist modes of listening could be deployed? In response to sonic abundance, how can we learn to hear “more,” to “over-hear?” This talk departs from these questions, addressing recent works by artists and theorists working with sound to propose a series of strategies for listening experimentally—to sound in itself, but also, and more importantly, to the complex and profuse relations it engenders.
A public programme of
Tarek Atoui The Ground: From the Land to the Sea.