Paysage Sonore with the participation of artists: Dominique Blais, Felix Blume, Virginie Cavalier, Anne Laure Cros, Christian Delécluse, Léa Dumayet, Erick Flogny, Mirna Maalouf, Bertrand Planes and Olivier Lasson, Scenocosme, Dimitri Vazemsky Curators: Aude de Bourbon Parme
What is the soundscape and why are we interested in it? How can we work the invisible as a visual artist? The exhibition in the gardens of the Château d'Esquelbecq this year raises these questions and, through the dozen or so invited artists, offers avenues for reflection. It resonates with two partner events: the Triennale Art et Industrie de Dunkerque entitled Chaleur Humaine and Rendez-vous au jardin, a national event on the theme of musicality.
In our image society, we learn above all to see, rarely to hear. The exhibition Paysage Sonore aims to highlight the sense of hearing, often relegated to the background. It encourages visitors to listen carefully to the environment in which they live: the Flemish garden, the landscaped park, the greenhouse of the historic vegetable garden… It invites them to feel what is specific to them and to take a fresh look at the soundscapes of their daily lives. To this end, the selection of works on display focused on proposals for experiences that relate to what surrounds them and to visitors. The works are thus to be experimented as sound sources (Anne-Laure Cros, Virginie Cavalier, Mirna Maalouf), revelators (Léa Dumayet), amplifiers of the sound environment (Christian Delécluse), fragments of sound landscape coming from a distant or near elsewhere (Felix Blume, Mirna Maalouf), staff or collective (Dominique Blais, Dimitri Vazemsky, Erick Flogny, Bertrand Planes and Olivier Lasson).
Hearing, a misvalued meaning highlighted in this case Why is it important to develop attention to sound? The exhibition echoes a contemporary tendency to understand the importance of this meaning, whether in cinema or in art exhibitions. For listening attentively appeals to our knowledge and memory, just as much as to our imagination, free not to rely on what the gaze sees. The works exhibited reveal the ability of sounds to teleport, in a given place and time, by appealing to our memories (Bertrand Planes and Olivier Lasson).
Learning to listen The exhibition proposes to take the time to listen to know, understand, savour, rather than just hear. Raymond Murray Schafer, whose research inspired this exhibition, talks in his book Le Paysage Sonore* de clairaudience about an education that would mark the end of foggy ears. The visitor can thus curl up in a work (Christian Delécluse, Léa Dumayer), kiss a tree (Scénocosme), sit around a table (Eric Flogny, Dimitri Vazemsky), raise their eyes to the sound of sculptures (Anne-Laure Cros, Scénocosme, Mirna Maalouf), walk and be surprised (Bertrand Planes and Olivier Lasson, Felix Flume).
An ecological approach
According to the anthropologist and philosophy of science Bruno Latour*, to become aware of our environment, that is to say to situate oneself, consists in inventorying and characterizing the interactions that are indispensable to us, the interdependent relationships with our environment. The work of Virginie Cavalier, mineral, vegetable and animal, symbolizes this interdependence. While Anne Laure Cros gives shape to what is invisible.
Being aware of sounds reveals the existing to be preserved (animals, natural elements), as well as what can disturb (circulations, machines) in order to understand what needs to be protected. The famous bio-acoustician Bernie Krause - whose works became works were exhibited at the Fondation Cartier (Le Grand Orchestre des animaux, 2012) and the Philharmonie de Paris (Musicanimale, 2022) - has it not observed the disappearance of certain species by discovering the disappearance of their sounds in nature? «Only an overall appreciation of the acoustic environment can give us the means to improve the sound orchestration of the world» wrote Raymond Murray Schafer, and we add: and thus the links between beings and things.
The multiple artistic proposals to be experimented physically are invitations to take the time, in the idyllic setting of the gardens of the castle of Esquelbecq, to discover our sound environment, whether natural or artificial, and to meet works, artists, memories, sounds.
PRACTICAL INFORMATION Art au Jardin 2023 Paysage Sonore From 3 June to 17 September Opening Saturday 3 June
See you on Saturday 1st and Sunday 2nd July for the Night of Books in Esquelbecq: workshop, performance and meeting
Esquelbecq Castle 10 Pl. Alphonse Bergerot 59470 Esquelbecq chateau-esquelbecq.com @chateaudesquelbecq Contact: contact@chateau-esquelbecq.com Johan Tamer-Morael: +33 (0)6 73 44 06 66