Co-sounding

“Co-sounding\" is an interactive art project based on an artistic research that interrogates the visual dominance of Western landscape representation as a colonial practice that posits land as a passive object for the consumptive gaze of the viewer. The installation of Co-sounding invites the audience to listen intimately to sound recordings gathered at the present sites portrayed in several historic landscape paintings from the European romantic era that also coincides with its colonial histories. The exhibition consists of several custom-built empty but framed canvasses informed by the canonical landscape paintings while audience interaction with them builds participatory sonic narratives. Equipping the canvases with speakers and multitude of sensors, the sounds are made to spill over the frames encompassing the positions of the viewers. The work thus delves into a sonically empowered unpacking of the colonial-era landscape paintings to listen intimately in between the shades to reveal epistemic layers. Considering these landscape paintings as constructs of European colonization of lands and the Anthropocene, the project aims to destabilize these sterile art objects found in European museums today by exploring sensor technology and sonic interaction design as participatory tools for public interventions.