Brandon LaBelle (b. 1969, USA)
Conversation Piece, 2010

Audience is admitted to an empty room and invited to listen – is there something? … Most descriptions omit the detail of how they end up scribbling things on the walls, listening to each others’ mark making.

Even if I have not experienced the piece myself and some of its mechanics remain the mystery, it is relevant for this list on two accounts: 1) it has clear parallels with my “Find The Art Piece” where the audience is invited to find “my artwork” in a room, this invitation being my only contribution; 2) I am interested in works where the audience is actively contributing to the formal qualities of the work as well as to its meanings.

I remain confused, though, how listening to the room where nothing is sounding deliberately is segued into drawing on the walls as the means to produce some sound to listen to… And how does the hand-out of headphones with sounds of people dancing tie into that?! Perhaps, if considered strictly as a presentation of several modes of engagement with sound – regardless of the visual component – the piece would not seem incoherent… which opens new conceptual possibilities for me – to make visually incoherent sound works as a way to make the point that it is a sound work and that any attention paid to visual incoherence is excessive and only reveals the audience’s possible privileging of sight that then can be addressed… which also shows that sometimes it is productive to consider even incomplete documentation of the work – who knows, my conclusions might not be valid for LaBelle’s work, but they may come handy in development of my practice anyway.