"Attunements—are they not like cloud shadows flitting across the landscape, utterly fleeting and elusive?"
— “Description of the Situation: Fundamental Attunement” by Martin Heidegger
"The most perfect music first responds to human affairs, then accords with the principles of the Universe and aligns with the Five Virtues. Only then can it bring order to the spontaneity of Nature itself, harmonize the four seasons, and achieve perfect attunement among all living things."
— The Revolution of Heaven by Zhuangzi
Sound connects us to our surroundings and to each other through the process of attunement. Whether we perceive the meaning of attuning with sound through Martin Heidegger's metaphor of a cloud shadow gliding over the landscape or through Zhuangzi's concept of perfect music aligning with human affairs and nature's spontaneity, sound draws us into more than just listening. It invites us into the realms of vibration, reverberation, and resonance, engaging us in the dynamic pursuit of a radical understanding of other vitalities through attunement.
Attunement: Contemporary Politics between Mindscape and Soundscape presents the work of thirteen artists who use sound to explore its intersectionality with environmental justice, border politics, and the socio-economy of feeling. These artists, approaching sound from diverse disciplines and media, share a commitment to engaging with, rather than opposing or ignoring, material realities and environments. Their artistic responses range from Chinese ink scroll paintings to bioelectrodes, and from field recordings to various studies of sonic warfare throughout history, including pre-radar military acoustic devices from World War I, propaganda songs that transcended the Taiwan Strait's division by a legendary diva during the Cold War, and the ongoing sonic annexation of the Golan Heights.
The diversity of these works reflects the broadened scope of sonic practices in contemporary art, highlighting the context-specific histories of these practices and resonating with the cosmic affinities they engage. Attunements invites audiences to listen and engage by sensing and repositioning themselves within the contested terrain where environmental degradation, nationalist rhetoric, and the frequencies of capital converge. Here, the act of attunement becomes a political act of listening, emphasising that the way we listen shapes how we share the world. In an era marked by significant environmental challenges, polycrisis, hyper-connectivity, and shifting geopolitical landscapes, how do we attune our bodies and minds with our uncertain surroundings?
The exhibition's thematic grouping underscores the interconnectedness of elements—water, air, and earth—within our shared universe. By exploring how audiences engage with these works and by considering the interplay of these elements, Attunement emphasizes the influence of these subtle frequencies, mediated through water, air, and earth, and the atmospheric forces shaping our contemporary world. The artists in this exhibition transcend mere auditory perception, guiding audiences toward attunement as a perceptual and ethical orientation. Here, listeners become entwined with and transformed by the world's resonant field, transcending the intricate mechanisms of social governance. Through a diverse array of works exploring interconnected contexts, audiences are encouraged to move beyond passive listening and embrace a situated sense of sound that acknowledges our interdependence with all living entities.
Participating artists: Lawrence Abu Hamdan, Tarek Atoui, Ting-Jung Chen, Reena Saini Kallat, Kei Imazu and Bagus Pandega, Susan Schuppli, Nguyen Trinh Thi, Hajra Waheed, Lin Chi-Wei, Samson Young, Yuan Jai, Yu Cheng-Yao.