2006:Interventions

Nicole Cousino
www.nicolecousino.com
Chris Vecchio
www.noisemantra.com

SPEAKHERE! links bodies across space through sound. By setting up a speaker’s “hole” mounted on a busy intersection of Madrid and a sound system mounted in a park, personal songs, words, shouts, utterances and whispers will be transmitted in real-time to an unsuspecting audience.

Based loosely on the concept of the Speaker’s Corner in Hyde Park, London, SPEAKHERE! differs in that it provides the speaker/participant with anonymity. It offers the liberation and empowerment of expressing one’s self in public without the neurosis of being on view before a listening audience.

Expressing one’s ideas or opinions in a public space can be seen to be a contentious or political act and is often shunned, especially in urban cities. Usually the only voice projected in the public space is that of the state or a religious entity. This project provides an opportunity for a diverse array of individuals of various cultures, languages, perspectives, attitudes and opinions to express themselves to a potential audience.

The second difference between the Speaker’s Corner and SPEAKHERE! is that the one speaking into the “hole” will not know if there is a listener on the other end. Is one speaking to the wind, the trees, a crowd of elderly hard of hearing, police officers or children or…? But, if there is an audience listening, SPEAKHERE! aims to transform the public space by injecting it with a sense of the unanticipated and spontaneous.

Ubicación

Transmitter: c/Alcalá

Reciving end: Parque del Retiro, entrada Plaza de la Independencia.

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