a) write up your review. You may include any photographs and sounds you may have recorded.
During the Gallery Visit the lady introduced us what is Longplayer, she said this piece has been played for 23 years and is designed to last 1000 years. And she is one of the person incharge to maintain this piece. As we walk in we can see this piece is build inside of tower, which creates great echos when the sound plays out. We also discussed about the meaning of maintaining 1000 years, she said the artist leave this artwork here for us to protect it, however this artwork will be maintain for 1000 years, which many of the protecters might not be able to stay with the piece forever. Therefore after thousands of years, who will be the one here to maintain it? And who will be here to listen, what is the meaning of this work? This made me think, because duration is always a considerable topic for many industry. And I believe this is the meaning of this piece, the artist is trying to maintain and keep this duration of something does not change inside of the fast developing world.
b) Reflect on what interested you about this piece. With reference to Steven Connor’s text “Ears Have Walls” think about how a durational sound art work such as Longplayer contrasts with a visually-led conception of art in the gallery context.
Steven Connor defined Sound in his text “Ears Have walls”, he states that “Sound is arousing and dangerous because it can so easily penetrate and permeate, so effortlessly become the soft catastrophe of space.” Use his understanding as reference, which means sound contains permeation it will largely increase the level of impact it has towards the audience compares to visual artworks. He has explicitly explains the difference between how visual and sound works for human body, “We inhabit sound, because it happens to us. We do not inhabit the world of vision because our acts of looking are constantly doing things to that world.” He explained how sound is impacting us but visual is impacting by us.
2) Start reading Sonic Arts from Trevor Wishart and pick a line that you found the most interesting. Try to add your thoughts to it (such as why it resonates with you or if you don’t agree, form discussions).
“We can begin by saying that sonic art includes music and electroacoustic music. At the same time, however, it will cross over into areas which have been categorised distinctly as text-sound and as sound-effects. Nevertheless, focus will be upon the structure and structuring of sounds themselves. I personally feel there is no longer any way to draw a clear distinction between these areas” – what is sound art? The categorise of sound art
“In future it might therefore be better if we referred to ourselves as sonic designers or sonic engineers, rather than as composers, as the word ‘composer’ has come to be strongly associated with the organisation of notes on paper.” – when the label of music has been set, it will need key terms to be developed to add into the public’s dictionary. At the same time, Sonic is not only associated with notes.
3) Pick a location (such as a park/gallery/street) and sit down. Bring paper and coloured markers. Close your eyes and actively listen to your surroundings. Then, try to illustrate this experience on paper using different colours to categorise each sound in a stereo field regarding their frequency content, their closeness, and how frequent/important they are to the scenery).
