November 02, 2005
JEFF TALMAN
IN TRANSIT
International artist Jeff Talman will mount a new installation--In Transit--in an exhibition that explores the sonic resonance of the InterContinental Hotel atrium. In this site-specific sound work Talman exposes the nuances embedded in the ‘silence’ of the 4-story, dome-capped space.
In Transit features the actual resonant frequencies of the atrium extracted from the room tone or ‘silence’ of the site. Installed in the hotel atrium, the installation feeds the site resonance back into the space. Because the resonance is perfectly tuned to the site it is naturally amplified by the space. The results are a re-resonating sound field in which the inherent sonic ‘presence’ of the atrium itself is brought forward for the listener as intuitive notions of sound and spatial perception are enhanced.
Regarding the title, Talman noted, “We are constantly in transit – moving through spaces – with too many other concerns to spend much time reflecting on where we are, where we have come from, and where we are going. When we do reflect on our surroundings, we acquire the sense of a place largely through visual perception. But our place-sense is also highly dependent on the self-sound of a site, of which we have a much lower consciousness, perhaps only an intuitive grasp. By emphasizing this unique place sound I hope to make available a larger, instinctive sense of site that is fundamental to our perception of the world.”
In the InterContinental Hotel – Chicago, exploring the sound of ‘silence’: NOV. 7 – 13, 2005
Talman’s other new soundspace installation, ‘Absolute Elsewhere,’ which is based on similar properties of site resonance, opens three days later on November 10 in St. James Cathedral, which is near the hotel. The two installations coincide with the Nineteenth Conference of the Society for Literature, Science and the Arts, which is one of the installations’ sponsors along with the University of Illinois-Chicago, and Emerson College, Boston where Talman teaches. He is represented by bitforms in New York City.
Posted by jo at November 2, 2005 10:05 AM
