1. Isa Genzken, Ohr, 1980, Chromogenic Color Print mounted on chipboard in artist's frame, 176,5 x 120 x 3 cm, Courtesy Galerie Buchholz, © 2023
"The ability to hear sounds"
After the reorganisation of the collection presentation, the Museum Tinguely in Basel present its first important exhibition of the year: À bruit secret - Hearing in Art. While the exhibition is the fourth show out of the five exhibitions planned around the senses of the human body, it tries to define a sense we use every day, while listening to music, cooking, working, etc.
In the dictionary; hearing is described as stated: "the ability to hear sounds", but how does sound can be transformed into an inspiration or an important part of a work of art? To respond to this question, the curator has invited and presented: Kader Attia, Ursula Biemann, George Brecht, Pol Bury, Cevdet Erek, Dominique Koch, Christina Kubisch, Fortunato Depero, Marcel Duchamp, Isa Genzken, Hermann Goepfert, Rolf Julius, František Kupka, Oswaldo Maciá, Marcus Maeder, Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Carsten Nicolai, Emeka Ogboh, Meret Oppenheim, Nam June Paik, Alexander Tillegreen, Robert Rauschenberg, Dieter Roth, Luigi Russolo, Kurt Schwitters, Jean Tinguely, Bill Viola, Jorinde Voigt and James Webb.
"À bruit secret" 1916
The title of the exhibition curated by Anna Müller-Alsbach makes a direct reference to the ready made of Marcel Duchamp: "À bruit secret" made between 1916 and 1964 with his patron Walter Arensberg. The goal of this small object was to refer to the secret and acoustic of our everyday objects such as the cords, which is sealed between two copper plates screwed together in the ready made of Marcel Duchamp. He later stated about the sound of this particular object: "And to this day, I do not know what it is (discussing about the sound and the object inside the ball of cord). On the brass plate, I wrote three short sentences that actually lack letters, just as in neon writing the word becomes illegible when the letter does not light up".
With this introduction by Marcel Duchamp, you can see a small personification of an object to the actual form of the ear. Thus, the structural form of the human ear, function as a receiver of sound waves which is translated into the perception of our environment.
Of course the ear can be looked at a personal figuration in the object of Marcel Duchamp, but also like a real photographic subject with the large-format image of the German born artist Isa Genzken.
In her process, Isa Genzken spontaneously approach women in New York to photograph them. This series showcase the difference and uniqueness of each other organs but also the attention to this small part of our body which have a sculpture like quality.
Sounds and modern art (1900 - 1970)
In this first section of the exhibition, the visitor encounter works made between 1900 and 1970, which equal to the period of Modern Art. During this period of the avant-garde, the boundaries between different kind of mediums such as painting, music, photography, became fragile. Some of the artist were actually listening to music, the street, or even being inspired by both such as Piet Mondrian or Vassily Kandinsky.
At one point, we gave this concept a name: Gesamkunstwerk, a work which entitles all of the media and mediums.
At the same moment in Italy, while the Fascist came into power, the Futurist movement decided to use this political content and to use it as a critic of their time. In the Futurist Manifesto, written by the artists of the movement, they described the importance of aesthetic.
In other part of the world and other art movement and practice, sound was mostly shown for the abstraction and fragmentation of language and the acoustic.
Most of this concept is showcase in the work of Kurt Schwitters titled "Sonata in Urlauten" made in 1922-1932. In this composition, the artist uses for the first time a composition exclusively made out of spoken sounds and independent sound materials, which he later performed in front of the audience.
Contemporary resonance to sounds (1970 - 2023)
After this historical contextualisation of the history of sound making and the importance of sound as an inspiration for many artists, the exhibition also traces and evokes contemporary interpretations made between the 1970s and today.
For example the work "Silent Mountain" (2001) of the American artist Bill Viola. In this diptych consisting of two separated videos, the artist present a woman (on the left) and a man (on the right) which present to the viewer strong and deep emotions associated to pain and sadness. Thus, "Silent Mountain" from 2001 is part of a lager series of video titled "The Passions" which the artist begun in 2000.
In this series, the American videographer decided to focus on the intensity of human emotions through visually powerful video works in extreme slow motion and without sound.
Most of the work of this series, like suggest the titled come from paintings and compositions or religious works from the 15/16th century.
On contrary to the religious works of the time which generally has a gold background and a small scale, the works of Viola is filmed against a black background, which neutralise the scene and make you aware of the small changing movements of the actors upper bodies, gestures, and facial expressions.
On the other side, the works of the German Artist Joined Voigt is mostly made out of colourful sheets of paper in which she develops and investigates diverse phenomena of material and immaterial reality and their perception, in which she divides into series of works.
Many of her works are based on musical parameters, which she transfers into a given theme, independent visual language and specific artistic techniques.
She uses a scalpel to cut out various shapes from coloured paper, and later she assembles these shapes into a form and structure, among other things, by overlapping and folding the paper pieces. This assemblage will create a paper relief, like the one shown in the exhibition which is part of a larger series titled "Rhythm" from 2022-2023.
The titled of the series, "Rhythm" come from the Greek ῥυθμός, rhythmos, and it refers to any regular, recurring movement over time.
Informations about the exhibition
Place: Museum Tinguely
Date: 22.2.2023 – 14.5.2023
Curators: Anna Müller-Alsbach
Ticket: Available on the website of the Museum Tinguely OR at the front desk of the museum
Informations about the Museum Tinguely
Museum Tinguely
Paul Sacher-Anlage 2 - P.O Box 3255
CH-4002 Basel
Phone: +41 61 681 93 20
Mail: basel.infostinguely@roche.com