Kaleidoscopic Tree Prints and Sounds of Nature Take Over a Gallery

Piezo speakers use a constellation of wires, magnets, and small golden plates to produce a distinct frequency and unique auditory output, and are a key part of artist Alexandre Joly's exhibition Come Close To How I Feel With The Wild Visions at Fresh Window Gallery. The artist equipped a series kaleidoscopic prints of forests with the specialized speakers, each emitting the sounds of nature simultaneously to overwhelm the viewer.

The prints Joly has included in the show manage to be natural and strangely artificial. The images of forests are geometric and symmetrical to degrees that are rarely encountered in nature, with harsh, sharp edges and completely mimicked detail repeating across their wooden surfaces, ultimately looking more like computer generated abstractions or extraterrestrial life forms than depictions of backwoods foliage.

What is most notable about the installation is the incessant overlapping of sounds that fills up the tight gallery space. Each work produces authentic and familiar sounds of nature, such as the chirping of birds and crickets, the shimmering sound of trees in the wind, and falling drops of rain. The overpowering fusion of multiple tracks playing at once causes these references to nature to feel artificial, echoing the imagery of the prints.

Using artificial abstraction rather than representation, the manufactured quality of the works bring the viewer closer to nature. “The sound installation is a way for me to sculpt time and space. My aim is to touch a deep memory or trigger a strong feeling in the listener through the sound. I want it to connect the listener to his or her own experience of life or of nature,” Joly tells The Creators Project. “For that, the listener must devote themselves to a sensitive listening, and they must take time. I also like to evoke a world of visions, which may appear in the landscape as a veil or a lace.”

Through their wide range of amplitudes and pitches, the piezo speakers seem crucial in achieving Joly’s goal. “Using piezos are a very exciting way to physically experiment with sounds in relation to a space. I like to evoke the idea of a sound acupuncture,” adds Joly. “I’m really interested in the idea of playing sound through hundreds (and sometimes thousands) of points, and to be able to ‘draw’ with them.”

Come Close To How I Feel With The Wild Visions recently finished its run at Fresh Window Gallery. More of Alexandre Joly’s work can be found here.

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