fixed media, for acousmatic sound diffusion
- performed at MANTIS-LICA festival, Lancaster, UK (2008)
- performed at MANTIS South-North festival, Manchester, UK (2007)
“une certaine vibration de la nature s’appelle l’homme.” — from Notes premières de l’‹‹homme››, Francis Ponge.
Drawing on a fragmentary text by the French poet Francis Ponge, this work explores the tension between the observed and the lived in relation to the human body.
Ponge sought to describe material objects with great precision. He ‘gave a voice to things’. Words were carefully chosen according to their ability to resonate with the thing being examined. It was important to Ponge that we understand our relation to the world and our position in nature, and this requires that we allow the material world to speak.
How to approach the human being/body in this perspective? We have a unique experience of our bodies: we ‘live’ them, and yet they are somewhat foreign to us (to paraphrase Ponge, we rarely see our own blood, and if we do, we worry about it!). We observe others to better know ourselves. We are things in the material world yet often overlook this dependence and connection. This piece opens an ear to our bodily matter, giving place to that vibration of nature that is human being.