Your Brain Has No Smell
2017/2029
audio installation, 35 min.
“Notice this? Now that I try to cut, the squid like membrane makes it very hard… I’ll need a sharper knife.
I’ll cut from the top, through the middle, over the length of your head.”
“But also, light will fall through closed eyelids like it does through a thin skull . So I know you still perceive light.
And colours change when you move ; orange, red, yellow … patterns and shades when trees interfere with the sun playing with that thin layer of blood that filters your view.”
“Though your ears are so much closer and the speed of perceiving sound is unbeatable, processing the meaning of words, my sentences, takes more time than touch. But I’m talking about time in quantities you’ll find hard to grasp.
How long does it take for your brain to realize that you didn't blink but that I switched off the light?”
The above quotes are excerpts from the script.
Images:
1. Installation in three different clearings in the forest, each with a swivel stool and headphones at 6th International, multi-disciplinary site-responsive art biennale at I-Park, East-Haddam, USA, 2017
2. Installation view at Helicotrema, Recorded Audio Festival, Teatro di Palazzo Grassi, 2017, Venice, Italy
3. As installed in GET RID OF YOURSELF (ANCORA ANCORA ANCORA) at Fondazione Baruchello, Rome, 2019, a collective sound exhibition that took shape in the dark, curated by Lucrezia Calabrò Visconti in collaboration with Almare
Excerpt (recommended to listen on headphones 🎧):
Your Brain Has No Smell (2017/2019)
Concept and script: Erica van Loon
Sound design, mixing and mastering: Malu Peeters
Voice: Emi Kodama
Editing script: Ro Heinrich and Heleen van Loon
Sources for the script were among others conversations with neuro-anatomist Cindy Cleypool.
Part of its development took place during residencies at Fundaziun Nairs, Scuol (CH) and I-Park, East-Haddam, USA.
Spin-off project: The Second the Water Wets Your Face Reflexes of Your Aquatic Ancestors Kick In (2024)