The objective of this project is the creation of sonic actions in the public space, of a contextual nature, with the objective of inviting people to listen to the environment, the people and themselves. This through momentarily interrupt the everyday to listen to us and so try to generate a reflection and dialogue with the places and people; to try to recover the perception of our sound environment, through awareness, think and question our sound experiences, from various criteria, objective and subjective, personal, social, economic, political…

The city
Nowadays, the cities are a reflection of the reordering of the society, territory and policy under a single model, subordinated to the neoliberal economics and finance, where the only valid development is that of wealth through mass production, distribution and consumption. In neoliberalism the people, the social groups, the cultural differences, the economic inequality and the inequality of rights, matter less and less.
We have been invaded though an over saturation of visual and sound advertising through different means of communication, which “do not seek the transmission of information, seek ideological identification.” [1] We have been invaded with its urbanism, which with its imposing roads, buildings and private spaces, helps to isolate the meeting and contact between the inhabitants of the city. The needs and lacks of the citizens are no longer taken into account. Through the media and urban design is encouraged the individualism, people are disconnected from the spaces that go through and from the other people. It fosters fear against the others, discrimination and censorship of those who are different. Spaces have been created where there is no room for reflection and coexistence. The cities have been dehumanized, they have been placed at the service of economic and financial activity.
In that sense, I think it is necessary to enable new places of encounter, coexistence, dialogue, exchange of ideas and opinions, recognition of otherness.
Public spaces, physical and virtual, are presented as ideal places for this, since they are the spaces o social relations, where we come across different opinions, ways of thinking and acting, with different social classes and cultures… are a reflection of the diversity. However, they are also spaces of conflict, each social group and in turn each person has a different perception of the world. This determines that communication is essential for dialogue, generate understanding and reach agreements, without imposing particular interests. Public spaces can and should be places of exchange of information and generators of knowledge. I think art can contribute to it.

The sound and the listening
I am interested in working with sound for the properties it contains as a means of information and communication. Sounds are social productions, part of the culture where they are produced. “The have concrete meanings” [2] that inform us about where we are, the our of the day, the season of the year, a particular place, etc. The sounds influence the everyday behaviors, “are presented to our ears in multiple ways, with meanings and various messages: words, music, noise, each with their own codes that produce diverse reactions, feelings and sensations”, [3] and help us to locate the time, space, and the context in which we find ourselves. “The sounds and noises are necessary in life, are the sign of the presence of another person”. [4]
However, by various factors, we just pay attention to the sounds. “Although our relationship with the environment depends on the sound stimuli of the environment, whether or not we are aware of it”. [5]
“An attentive listening of the soundscape allows to pass from a simple description of the sounds to the analysis of the relations that exist between the human being, the sounds and the places”. [6] It is necessary to recover and reclaim the listening to generate new ways of relating and understanding our context, “rediscovering dimensions of our daily life little taken into account”. [7] “It is necessary to recover and reclaim the importance of sound in everyday life as an element of communication, information and transmission of emotions.” [8]
Sound experiences help us to understand the spaces and places we inhabit, the age we live in, and how we relate to people and ourselves. The more we understand the world, more tools we have to help transform it.

About the interventions
I intend to make sound and public art works that take into account the context of the places and their soundscape, works that start directly from the sound produces in the different places and the perceptions of the listeners. Works that intervene the daily sounds and noises to listen more attentively the places, and above all to listen to each other. More than change the sounds of the city, I’m interested in change the way we listen to it, and the way of live it through sounds, to become aware of how we perceive sounds and how we produce them, how we help or harm the sound interaction with the people who surround us. I’m interested that people hear something different that sounds and music produced by the policy and business, and to reflect on this. Think of the landscape is to think about the other, in us… is to think of the life.
I would like that the works be integrated into the context, where the receivers are the creators of their own “sound world”.

Intervention no. 1 *
Sound recordings were made from one of the fountains of the walkway 5 de mayo and from the fountain of Plaza de Armas, Queretaro, Mexico, during a week and at the same time, at 17:00 and 17:30 hrs. respectively.
A date later, with the sound recordings and through seven portable speakers, the places mentioned were intervened at the same hour in which sound recordings were made.

 

Intervention no. 2 *
I recorded the sounds of the corner of the streets Luis Pasteur and 16 de septiembre, Queretaro, Mexico, from four different points a Saturday night, day that are placed various food vendors, street musicians, and many people pass o meets at that place.
A date later, a Wednesday in the morning, when the social activity is very different, the recordings were projected through four megaphones, from the four points where the recordings were made.

 

Intervention no. 3 *
In the Historical Center of Queretaro, Mexico, routes were planned and toured, recording the sounds produced in these a Friday and a Saturday between 17:00 and 17:30 hrs each day.
A date later, another Friday and Saturday, between 17:00 and 17:30 hrs, the same routes were toured projecting the recordings made in these through megaphones.

Part of this intervention was done in collaboration with the project [Re] Post of Astrolabio I Investigación Escénica – http://astrolabio.mx/

 

Intervention no. 4
It is an intervention in public spaces of the Historical Center of Queretaro, Mexico, in which through a series of questions, people are invited to listen to different parameters of the soundscape.
The questions are projected through an audio recording, and this through a megaphone. Between each question was left a space of 15 seconds.

 

Intervention no. 5
In the Jardín Guerrero, in the Historial Center of Queretaro, Mexico, several people were asked what were the sounds they listen in that place, at the same time were made sound recordings of their answers, which a date later were projected through three megaphones in the Jardín Guerrero.

 

* Project beneficiary of the Support Program for Artistic Production “Apoyarte” 2015 of the Queretano Institute of Culture and Arts.

 

Notes
[1] Morales, Taniel. Medios de comunicación – Visión biológica. Obtained in the link: http://www.tanielmorales.com/textos/quiste.pdf (Consulted the 06/12/2014).
[2] Carles, José Luis. El paisaje sonoro, una herramienta interdisciplinar: análisis, creación y pedagogía con el sonido. Encuentro Iberoamericano sobre Paisajes Sonoros. 12-15 Junio 2007, Madrid, España. Obtained in the link: http://cvc.cervantes.es/artes/paisajes_sonoros/p_sonoros01/carles/carles_01.htm (Consulted the 06/12/2014).
[3] Idem.
[4] Atelier Permanent D’initiation á L’environnement Urbain – Montpellier-Mèze. Écoutez la ville! Pour une éducation à l’environnement sonore.Offset Deux Mille – 1er trimestre 2006; pp. 45.
[5] Carles, José Luis. El paisaje sonoro, una herramienta interdisciplinar: análisis, creación y pedagogía con el sonido. Encuentro Iberoamericano sobre Paisajes Sonoros. 12-15 Junio 2007, Madrid, España. Obtained in the link: http://cvc.cervantes.es/artes/paisajes_sonoros/p_sonoros01/carles/carles_01.htm (Consulted the 06/12/2014).
[6] Atelier Permanent D’initiation á L’environnement Urbain – Montpellier-Mèze. Écoutez la ville! Pour une éducation à l’environnement sonore.Offset Deux Mille – 1er trimestre 2006; pp. 50.
[7] Augoyard, Jean-François. Les pratiques d’habiter a travers les phénomènes sonores – Contribution a une critique de l’habitat. ESA Paris, 1978.
[8] Carles, José Luis. El paisaje sonoro, una herramienta interdisciplinar: análisis, creación y pedagogía con el sonido. Encuentro Iberoamericano sobre Paisajes Sonoros. 12-15 Junio 2007, Madrid, España. Obtained in the link: http://cvc.cervantes.es/artes/paisajes_sonoros/p_sonoros01/carles/carles_01.htm (Consulted the 06/12/2014).

 

Bibliography
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– Augoyard, Jean-François. Les pratiques d’habiter a travers les phénomènes sonores – Contribution a une critique de l’habitat. ESA Paris, 1978.
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– Morales, Taniel. Medios de comunicación – Visión biológica. Obtained in the link: http://www.tanielmorales.com/textos/quiste.pdf (Consulted the 06/12/2014).

 

 

Public Spaces / Listening Spaces by Balam Ronan is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.