Ethnographic Terminalia 2012: Audible Observatories
The Ethnographic Terminalia Curatorial Collective is pleased to be opening our fourth annual exhibition of works at the intersection of anthropological and contemporary art practice. Audible Observatories is taking place in San Francisco in conjunction with the meetings of the American Anthropological Association, from Nov. 14-19. It includes installations at SOMArts, Alley Cat Gallery, and as a Distributed Exhibition of sound-based works at public sites around San Francisco.
From our website:
Audible observatories are points of sensory convergence. They are nodes where worlds perceived through the senses intersect and begin the labour of transforming independent events into knowable and meaningful claims. They speak and they are spoken to. Audible Observatories brings together works that draw attention to both the situation and the agency of the observer.
The curators for Audible Observatories make a playful connection between research-based art and place-bound exhibition in order to animate a curatorial vision that foregrounds audio-centric art works within a broader rubric of site-specificity. We conceptualize the audible observatory as either a mobile or a stationary site of perception that is sensible to others just as it is a place from which sensing the world happens. The relationship between listening and being heard is central to the audible observatory; it is meant to be a relentlessly self-reflexive site of communication in which location-specificity is central in its aesthetic.
~ Ethnographic Terminalia curatorial collective.
Audible Observatories will take place in San Francisco in November, 2012. This exhibition is organized by Ethnographic Terminalia—a curatorial collective dedicated to exploring the borderlands between contemporary art and academic research. In the last three years Ethnographic Terminalia has mounted exhibitions featuring the works of international artists and ethnographers in Philadelphia, New Orleans, and most recently Montréal.
- Karin Bolender’s ‘Gut Sounds Lullaby’
