AH, AM, CI, CW, JS, JG, JMSB, JS, NG, RG, SS, YF
Installation with 12 headphones and 12 audio pieces
19 minutes
2014 | Zurich
The collective project of individual students of the Media Arts specialisation was experienced at the diploma exhibition as an installation of 12 ceiling-mounted headphones. The headphones all played the same audio piece at the same time, generating a kind of loudspeaker. The viewer could stroll through the installation, but also consciously stop, put on a pair of headphones and take the time to listen to this voice that was currently speaking. The 12 audio pieces were played linearly in time as a loop. This form of immediacy was equally in keeping with the content, that of the Artists Statements. It took time and patience to listen to these artists’ statements, or more manifestos, individually in their complexity but also to grasp the overall picture.
None of the audio pieces is a concrete description of a specific work. They do not commit themselves. The convention of an artist statement is questioned and broken. The openness in the choice of language, as well as in the length of the statement, in which they are all very different, was certainly decided this way.
The Artist Statement, has been a phenomenon in art since the 90s and is similar to the Art Manifesto. It is explained as didactic, descriptive and reflective. In it, there is an awareness of one’s own intention of artistic practice, which is surrounded by a certain discourse. It describes the artistic activity or the work of art, but not only, it usually becomes part of it.
This phenomenon is decisively addressed. In addition, this work is intended as a connecting element between the individual, individual works in the diploma exhibition, which sets a framework for the exhibition. It allows reflection on the in-between and the Media Arts degree programme itself.
