A Building Made of Sound: Sonic Materialities, Reflections, Ingestions (report)

With: Mariana Carvalho, Samuel Perea-Díaz, and Gascia Ouzounian

A three-hour sonic experiment exploring strategies for engaging architectural materials through sound and listening. The event took place on the premises of the GlogauAIR site: an architectural landmark designed by Ludwig Hoffman in 1894; the building was purchased by Chema Alvargonzález, who envisioned an artist residency space for international artists, a purpose that persists to this day. As part of the event, Samuel Perea-Díaz, a current GlogauAIR artist-in-residence, explored sonic transductions through architectural materials, and the relocation of various sounds embedded in architectural materials within the building itself; Mariana Carvalho explored the embodied listening of architectural sounds, through inner cartographies, with included her practice of ‘eating’ and ingesting sounds including the voices of architectures and people participating in the event.

The workshop opened with an introduction by Gascia Ouzounian on technologically mediated listening, including through the use of binaural and stereo apparatus, both in historical contexts as well as in connection to contemporary architectures. We explored the development of ideas of spatial hearing, including in early psychological studies of binaural audition in the 19th century; and the development of spatial hearing technologies such as the théâtrophone, instruments for studying spatial hearing in scientific contexts, or technologies of sound detection for military purposes. This discussion stemmed principally from research in Gascia’s book Stereophonica: Sound and Space in Science, Technology, and the Arts.

The second part of the workshop was made of short listening exercises, experimenting with different contact microphones placed in different surfaces of the facade of GlogauAIR building. During this part of the workshop, participants were listening on site to a 4-channel geophone mic placed along all the windows of the cellar. The workshop also shared listening perspectives to hidden sonic physicality embedded in the surrounded architectural spaces where the workshop was taking place. This is the case of listening while recording electromagnetic fields, using electromagnetic microphones in the common gathering area of the kitchen and in Samuel’s exhibition.

From listening to the building mediated by microphones, we moved to a listening meditation focused on the body and its relation with the environment, combining internal and external listening perspectives. Participants were given a pair of ear protectors to play with the inner vs. outer listening perspectives and recorded voice messages into a Telegram group chat related to their listening experiences.

Samuel and Mariana suggested that the participants try out eating the group chat voice archive that was generated. Wearing the ear protectors, they could place the speakers of their phone in the entrance of their mouths, mouthlistening (which stems from Mariana’s long-term artistic research into ingesting voices). After that, one participant volunteered to eat the previously collected electromagnetic recording of the building, placing one speaker inside of his mouth. The participant was amplified by binaural microphones turned to their inside of the ear, and using ear protectors. With the use of a headphone amplifier, all the other participants could hear their internal listening, as they ingested the sounds.

Gascia´s talk