A tall wall of 1,344 white cardboard boxes winds across Zilkha as six speakers fill the gallery with a constant hum. This visual and audio installation greeted visitors Friday night at the opening reception of Zilkha Gallery’s latest exhibition, “Sol LeWitt and Alvin Lucier: A Collaboration.”
Conceptual artist LeWitt’s construction, “Curved Wall (Wesleyan),” accompanies Professor of Music Lucier’s “Six Resonant Points Along a Curved Wall” in the Main Gallery of Zilkha to start off the Spring 2005 season in the Center for the Arts.
The opening reception attracted many community members including current and past students of Lucier’s, curious to hear what the buzz was about, quite literally.
“In recent years sound has become a very important medium used by artists [in museums],” said Curator of Exhibitions Nina Felshin.
Lucier talked at the opening, explaining exactly what people were hearing and how they were hearing it. Before the wall of cardboard boxes went up, Lucier recorded the sounds of the empty gallery. An hour after the wall was made, Lucier returned to the gallery and burst balloons at six points along the wall where speakers now play cycles of the sounds of the empty gallery.
“The piece blooms from the pure ambient sound of the gallery into a different sound put at these six different points,” Lucier said. “I discovered a way of processing sound by cycling it through an acoustic space many times.”
A pioneer in experimental music, he used this same technique in this sound installation as well, creating what he described as a “sine wave effect.” Lucier had to pause his speech to let the full audience hear what he was describing.
LeWitt’s Curved Wall gives a visual reference to Lucier’s sounds.
“Sol’s [wall] is a sine wave of sorts so my piece’s sine wave is a mirror of that,” Lucier said.
Known for his wall drawings and large scale sculptures, this piece by LeWitt differs from others in its medium. The cardboard boxes were used as a substitute for his usual concrete constructions due to an uncertainty of whether or not the Main Gallery’s floor could support such a structure. However, stacked 14 boxes high and 96 winding across, the change of material does not detract from the large scale and monumentality of the sculpture. The plain white boxes echo the large concrete blocks that form the walls of Zilkha, while the smooth curves of the wall stand out in the geometrically rigid gallery and against the rectangular walls that enter the space.
According to Felshin, Lucier’s lasting impressions on students inspired the current show. In her opening remarks she said that at the Alumni Show last year more artists commented on the influence of Lucier’s 1969 piece “I am sitting in a room” over anything else at Wesleyan. Lucier then invited LeWitt to participate in the collaboration with him.
This is the third time the two have worked together, and the second time at Zilkha.
In addition to the collaboration in the Main Gallery, the connecting North Gallery is also exhibiting Lucier’s “Empty Vessels.” This site-specific installation explores the resonance and sounds of the North Gallery. Four speakers sit on platforms directly mirrored by four platforms each holding a green glass vessel with a microphone inserted in through the mouth.
“The volume is raised to the level of the feedback so the sound of the feedback is related to the vessel,” Lucier said. “As a body walks through, it disturbs the sound.”
He likened the auditory effects caused by walking between the microphones and speakers to walking through a pool of water and the displacement and ripples that occur, giving a more concrete and tangible example for those not as familiar with sound.
“I really liked ‘Empty Vessels,’” said Maggie Starr ’06. “It was interesting how it was an interactive way of dealing with the same sound things as in the Main Gallery.”
The exhibits will remain on display in Zilkha through Feb. 27. In addition to the actual exhibit, scores by Lucier are on exhibit in the Scores and Recordings collection of Olin Library. A colloquium on “Exploring the Music of Alvin Lucier” will be held on Feb. 2 and on Feb. 5 Lucier will perform his famous and influential “I am sitting in a room” in Zilkha.
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