Join us for a guided tour of the Standing Waves exhibition, where we'll delve into the work and artistic practice of Tarek Atoui. The tour will include the activation of his pieces, which serve as both instruments and sculptures for listening and auditory exploration.
The exhibition Standing Waves consists of a number of handmade instruments, which are simultaneously objects and aural sculptures. In addition to the spatial installation, the exhibition offers the experience of listening to an ever-changing composition, or a kind of outlandish concert, while its setting opens up the possibility of listening to the piece either dynamically or statically. The generated sound environment is a delicate, ever-changing microcosm, imbued with a sumptuous array of sonic textures triggered by a variety of materials, from stone and water to metal and wood. When creating his sculptures the artist starts from a reflection on the acquisition or emission of sound via the organic materials used, while incorporating electronic elements as a tool to explore the qualities of these materials, their acoustics, resonances, and sonic behaviour. Even the title of the exhibition, Standing Waves, sums up the character of the works presented, as it defines a physical phenomenon first described by Faraday when he observed standing waves on the surface of a liquid in a vibrating container, while the term itself was coined by Franz Melde, who illustrated the phenomenon in an experiment with vibrating strings.
Atoui’s spatial sound installations operate as seamless sonic environments in which space, architecture, instruments, and our bodies are at once receivers and conductors, forging compositions made up of fragments of soundscapes.
Guided tours will be held on Saturdays, Sundays, and Wednesdays at the Parter Gallery in Slovenian. Guided tour lasts 20 minutes.
