Clara Iannotta, Chris Swithinbank
I listen to the inward through my bones
octoberoct 7 – 18
© Académie de France à Rome (Villa Médicis, 2019) ©
Concept Clara Iannotta, Chris Swithinbank.
Acknowledgements Église Saint-Eustache
With the support of the Sacem
In partnership with La Muse en Circuit
The Festival d’Automne à Paris is producing this installation.
With the support of
Clara Iannotta's project is to listen to the city and its various life-forms, in a space, that of a church, which a priori preserves those inside from the noises outside. She does so by means of an electronic installation designed for the acoustics of the Church of Saint-Eustache, a building with a rich musical tradition, ranging from from Rameau to Berlioz.
Clara Iannotta has been familiar with the architecture of the Saint-Eustache church for a long time. With a fascination for its reverberations, rustling noises and crackles, she took full measure, in an in situ manner, of this exceptional and monumental acoustic space with the collaboration of composer Chris Swithinbank. The unique filtering that the building operates became the driving force for her piece. What we perceive is the centre of Paris, a collection of external noises which, as soon as they enter the church, become sound frequencies. The artist did not seek to merely present a work in the midst of this host of echoes, but rather to reveal through sound the incredible effect of the stone, wood, canvases and glass. She does so by means of a deambulatory performance. Clara Iannotta has recorded Paris at various times of the day, its streets, neighbourhoods and arrondissements, and retained the voices and tumult of traffic going by. She then exalts this city, filtered by the specificities of the nave, its aisles and chapels, galleries and tribunes. Like a cloud of sound hovering above the listener, the piece opens up different stopping points, or windows on the world, both outside and inside.
Interview with Clara Iannotta
