This season’s online exhibition by Victoria Arney LG, 2020
Earth/unearth
As we are all in lockdown I have changed my idea about what to put in THE GALLERY – I have been working for the last year on invisibility and in particular sounds and birdsong.
My first piece Earth/unearth is about speed and destruction. The second piece (below), Pellevoisin Wood Number 4, uses birdsong and it now seems like a good moment to show some of it even though it is still work in progress.
A year ago, I started recording birds, the first was a nightingale. Since then, I have spent most of the year researching and working with sonograms through woodcuts etchings and drawings trying to find visual equivalents . At the beginning of March I visited a friend who lives in central France – a very deserted area and I made a series of recordings of sounds on a walk, each stop being between 20 – 40 seconds long.
The one I am sharing with you was made in a small wood called Pellevoisin. If you listen carefully there are approx 11 different birds calling to each other over the space of 1 minute. I have taken this recording and put it through a birdwatchers sonogram programme on the computer slowed it down and then divided it up into 7 second fragments. So the 4 etchings here are in sequences of 14 seconds. 28 seconds in total.
Pellevoisin Wood
Over the quarantine period I am drawing or etching the whole walk. There were 11 recordings and the final one includes a hunt taking place in another wood.
I hope you enjoy this bit of outdoor sound. for more info visit my birdsong/blog
Victoria Arney LG 2020