Revitalization of Chiayi Sound Project

Following …And Europe Will Be Stunned by Yael Bartana, TheCube Project Space will present the sixth installment of the “Re-envisioning Society” series on August 25, Revitalization of Chiayi Sound Project, a collaboration between Yannick Dauby, Yen-Ting Hsu and Wan-Shuen Tsai.

The curatorial project “Re-envisioning Society” aims at manifesting and reflecting on the characteristics of contemporary life, as well as individual or collective life experiences and their changes, in order to construct a new vision and imagination of the contemporary society we are in. In particular, in view of the present “society of the spectacle”, it explores how we can discover the genuine relationships between people, between man and place and between places hidden behind the “spectacle” with a critical eye. While the previous installment  …And Europe Will Be Stunned explores controversial European history and political reality, Revitalization of Chiayi Sound Project probes into native Taiwan, using sound to manifest the texture of local culture, environment and society.
About Revitalization of Chiayi Sound Project

Are images only visual? How does the sense of hearing produce richer perceptions and imagination than the sense of sight? How do we reinterpret the materials collected in field investigation? Revitalization of Chiayi Sound Projectanswers these questions with a multi-layered listening space.

This exhibition originates in 2008, when the Cultural Affairs Department of the Chiayi County Government launched the project “Collection and Archiving of Chiayi Sounds”. Yannick Dauby from southern France and Yen-Ting Hsu who was a project manager at Tree Music & Art undertook the planning and the sound collection field work of the project. The then Director-General of the Cultural Affairs Department was the poet Chung Yung-fung. The project aimed at collecting sounds from the eighteen townships of Chiayi County and building a sound archive for future sharing.

During the implementation of the “Chiayi Sound Project”, the places, events and people whose sounds were worth recording were identified by consulting literature and local residents. During a period of 12 months, Yannick Dauby and Yen-Ting Hsu collected a multifarious array of sounds. They are divided into six themes: oral history, folk art, the natural ecology, industries, religion and festivities.

Three years after stage II of the “Chiayi Sound Project” was completed, Yannick Dauby, Yen-Ting Hsu and Wan-Shuen Tsai extract some sounds from the vast field recordings archive to construct a new aural environment to be presented in Revitalization of Chiayi Sound Project. The exhibition area is divided into several zones. The main area is a multi-channeled listening space set up with various sound reproduction devices. Based on the materials of the field recordings, the work is influenced by “sound documentary”. Even though the visual element is deliberately reduced, this exhibition is not lacking in images. During the process of listening, the audience/listeners will find that sounds can conjure up rich images in their imagination.

On the opening day of this exhibition on August 25, TheCube Project Space will invite Zhong Yong-Feng to hold a discussion with the three artists. Apart from looking back at the “Chiayi Sound Project”, they will also talk about the present state of Taiwanese sound culture.

*During the opening reception, guests are requested to speak softly to ensure the faithful rendering of the exhibition.
About Yannick Dauby

His sound practice was initiated around 1996, studying tape music (musique concrète in French) : discovery of the physicality of the magnetic tape, vertigo-inducing analog synthesis and acousmatic pleasures. However, it’s outdoor that things really started. He began working with field recording since 1998, during a travel in a distant country, capturing fragments of environments, urban situations, animal signals and unusual acoustic phenomenas. Those are his favorite materials, sometimes published like they are as phonographies, or providing some montage elements for some audio documentaries or musical compositions. On stage, he improvises mainly with recorded sounds, modular synthesizer and computer. Regular collaborations with other sound artists, contemporary dance (since 2007, produces soundtracks for Horse Dance Company in Taiwan) or in association with visual artists (such as the creations about landscape with Wan-Shuen Tsai). Experimenting the perception of acoustic spaces with sound installations. His active discography includes personal compositions, documentations of performances, and selected phonographies. Fascinated by ethnology and natural sciences, he often wanders into these domains in collaboration with naturalists or during community-based projects in Taiwan in Hakka or aborigine villages. Plans for the next years include more exploration sessions of the island through artistic activities and sound documentation as well as teaching actions. (www.kalerne.net)
About Yen-Ting Hsu

Her affinity to working with sound started from Chiayi Sound Project, which opened up her interests and study toward sound art. Yen-Ting investigates the connection among sound, life, environment, and ethno-culture; sound is her approach to realize different perspectives of today’s world. Adopting materials from field recordings to create audio documentaries and soundscapes, her works is often told with narrative. She went to England and France to carry out a study of “Web-radio as a platform of developing sound art” in 2010. In 2012, she was selected as a residency artist in Cheng-long Wetlands International Environmental Art Project, and used field recordings and recycled objects to create a sound installation in an old house of the village. Her sound works have shown in Formosa Show (England), Arte Radio (France), Lacking Sound Festival (Taiwan) etc. Currently she often tries to collaborate with groups or creators of performing art, and collaborates much with Chou/Shu-yi & Dancers.
About Wan-Shuen Tsai

Wan-Shuen Tsai grew up in the archipelago of Penghu, Taiwan. Studied and lived in France during several years and nowadays settled in the region of Taipei. Her artwork is shared between mixed-media installation, drawing, video and poetry. Her installations are ephemeral and constitutes a specific relationship to the physical space and architecture. Her image creation suggests an opening of narration and transforms a landscape into a mental space. In parallel of her personal projects, she collaborates since 2004 with sound artist Yannick Dauby under the group name Shijingren, focusing on audio-visual works about landscape. This project has been invited by artist residencies in France, Taiwan and Estonia. In 2008, founded Atelier Hui-Kan developping activities related to pedagogy, publication and communities (www.hui-kan.com). In 2006, she published a collection of her poems and she’s currently preparing the second one.