Site Line day 2
Credit: Nicole Zaaroura
2/4
Today we start with a sound walk.
Movement within the acoustic ecology of the building, and its architectural spaces. Its body and its hollows.
At one end of the gallery, we stop at a large mounted plaster sculpture .
From one side it reminds B of a huge sea shell, or ear.
We put our ears against it and listen, only to discover a mesmerizing echo as we whisper to each other…
We climb the stairs to the roof, stopping at certain points to stand still, close our eyes and listen.
Easier to detect and discover the layers of sound and the distant voices.
There is music playing on the lawn outside . With his eyes closed, B can also hear the swell of the sea rising up and down, watery sound waves. H says he feels his eyes bouncing off the ground as the music gets louder. The sounds alter the light behind my eyelids…
We walk to the other side of the roof.
Here the overlapping sound is a rhythmic conversation between the sound of rain and car tyres.
It feels harsher here. B says. ‘Like the pace of life and expectation’.
A return to the gallery space. It sounds padded, buttered, soft…
8 round mirrors and our phone cameras. Our movement now becomes a reflected choreography, more playful, focussed. A deeper inquiry.
In the gallery, onlookers move around us, giving us space. We can’t invite them to join in, to play because of the distancing and object touching restrictions, and so today they remain as fleeting witnesses.
We are immersed in a process of dislocation in order to relocate, until it is time to surface…
Words by Nicole Zaaroura. Keep up with Nicole’s blog here, for updates from behind the artist’s eyes.
