The sound mix design and control panel culminated in two public performances of this Hearing. These performances sought to unsettle the assumptions embedded in the public hearing model by reconfiguring several key components: voice, authority, participation, and control.
The first Hearing took place at the Folk Art Center in Syracuse. The installation deliberately blurred the boundaries between performance and civic reality, situated within the community center’s black box theater, a venue typically used for plays, rehearsals, and community events. While the seating arrangement mimicked a conventional public hearing, with rows of visitors facing a central stage, the methods of Hearing were intentionally different. The five mixes for Resident, Planner, City, Future, and Phantom were played on speakers throughout the space to create interference zones. In the front of the room, the speculative voice of the Future clashed and overlapped with the testimonies of Residents and Planners. At the center, the ambient presence of the City intertwined with these voices. Toward the back, echoes of the Phantom track carried fragments of past planning language, to relate and inform the contemporary.
These overlapping voices, some barely audible and others overpowering, produced a disorienting environment meant to unsettle expectations. The installation made legibility unstable by manipulating volume, positioning, and interference. This approach references noise theories as both a technical and political condition, where clarity and meaning are shaped by control over communication channels. I, the arbiter of the discussion, informed the control of the environment.
Prefomed Speach at the Beginning of the Hearing
The Conclusion to the Hearing and Review
The second Hearing explored the same themes and utilized the same tapes (with the notable exception that the City tape was replaced by a Detroit Techno Playlist). However, the position of each mix and the control of the environment were shifted. The installation was set up “in the round” within La Fiesta exhibition space, where listeners were encouraged to adjust the volume between the surrounding speakers utilizing the control panel. Each participant could alter the hierarchy of voices in real time, revealing how subtle shifts in amplification reshape narratives within the hearing environment. The sense of excitement and curiosity within the space felt especially significant to the larger discussion. As users engaged with each tape and experienced the shifting sonic environment, a noticeable curiosity emerged—either to lean in and better understand what was being said or to move on and explore a different voice.
Hearing at La Fiesta
Users Controlling Soundscape at La Fiesta
The Control Panel at La Fiesta
Captured by STOP PLAY GATHER. at La Fiesta