Espace SONO::Audio.Lab is almost pretentious in its completely unpretentious setting. Nestled in what most call a sketchy crossroad of downtown Montreal, SAT gallery is a small white-walled space with a slightly rough finishing touch. The Audio Lab setup doesn’t do much to embellish your art going experience either. A blue tent, a black box reminiscent of Alice in Wonderland, a large bed and 2 white couches that look like they were bought and decorated by students on an Ikea budget are the only visuals that grace this place. But that’s the point really. Whether you are lying on a bed, on your stomach in a tent, comfortably ensconced in a couch or deprived of vision huddled in the black box, Tobias C. Van Veen and his 36 artist friends want you to LISTEN[i].
There is much to appreciate. The beds and tent offer an array of sound recordings chosen from a short list and listened to with earphones to ensure that the auditor is one on one with his sound. From recordings of the Montreal subway with its familiar singing on departure, to an FM radio dial stopping up and down frequency to give us a glimpse of the day’s musical offerings, it’s easy to relax and focus in just the way the artists intend us to. The comfy couches offer a more musical experience, showcasing many remixes by the Montreal-based DJ Fishead, self-proclaimed annihilator of the status quo[ii]. He’s first and foremost a talented mixer and it’s easy to get into his samples. The same can’t be said of the artist formation Onetoofreefor, a Belgian duo whose sampling brings to mind a much more R-rated and angrier version of Peaches mixed with scratching some very sharp nails on a blackboard. I was so startled I almost kicked a hole in the tent lining[iii].
It’s on my way out the door however that I truly experienced the kind of deep listening the curator was explaining in his artsy terms at the door. Back in the black box, prostrated in an uncomfortable folding chair, I stumbled on Helen Thorington’s 9-11-Scapes. It’s a 17 minute soundscape constructed from samples collected on September 11th 2001 in and around the World Trade Center and gathered by NPR in the Sonic Memorial Project[iv]. In pitch black darkness, airplane crash and burning sounds lead to building alarms, crying and screaming, 911 calls and the crunching of the shovels that signify the retrieval of some two thousand bodies. Political issues regarding September 11th and its aftermath for the modern world of foreign policy aside, anyone with half a heart is mesmerized to realize that the sounds of 9-11 are even more haunting than the images we all know so well.
In this unpretentious space bereft of visual glossy aids then, curator Van Veen expects that we will be impressed just listening. That implies that what we hear is worth at the very least a strong reaction. And it sure does that. I was torn between going home to find out DJ Fishead’s next showcase and getting a strong pick-me-up as the black box and Helen Thorington had really ruined my precious Sunday.
[i] espace sono: list of artists featured in the exhibit.” 17 Sep. 2007 <http://upgrademtl.org/archives/Sept0507.htm
[ii] dj fishead. “FISHEAD – Espace sono Artist.” 17 Sep. 2007 <http://djfishead.com/>
[iii]For a taste of this innovative artistic genre: onetoofreefor mp3 samples.” 17 Sep. 2007 <http://data.projectsinge.net/onetoofreefor-mp3/
[iv] “The Sonic Memorial Project, Helen Thorington and the 9-11-scapes.” 17 Sep. 2007 <http://www.sonicmemorial.org/sonic/public/index.html>
Thanks very much indeed for the insightful review. Of interest, onetoofreefor aren’t using samples per se. Lucille Myrtilles, whose voice you hear, is something of a sound-poet, and her recordings are a live investigation of her body, in both pleasure (the big O) and pain. Listening to all 24 tracks back-to-back is quite something, I can assure you. cheers, tobias