Janet Cardiff: Time-travel via sonic waves

Janet Cardiff is an artist who creates audiovisual experiences, similar to the likes of Bill Fontana whereby she focuses on the sound, but she uses modern technology & editing techniques in such a way that she truly made me question whether an audio-focused experience could be considered virtual, or at least augmented reality clips.

She is most known for her audio walks, such as the Alter Bahnof walk, where she essentially takes us on a walk, usually through a distorted version of time, all the while connecting physical locations more to their sounds and making us question the nature of time, specifically making us think of sound & time as something less linear.

Many of her pieces remind me of some of the things Bill Fontana did in relation to space and time which I quite appreciate, specifically his piece Pigeon Soundings, but she develops on these concept, and offers an even higher feeling of participation on our part.

It is difficult to decide whether or not her visual-audio pieces are a form of virtual reality, but it is hard to deny that her participatory art pieces, which also involve her manipulating time, are at the very least a form of augmented reality.

In FOREST (For A Thousand Years) for example we are physically in this space of a forest, and by sound alone we are transported to different times of that very space, one moment there is the sound of logs falling, footsteps and the rustling of leaves, the next people laughing celebrating in the woods, wind blowing, some lumber is being harvested, I can only imagine sitting there felt like you were truly moving through time, as it did for me even just watching it on a computer monitor.

One Reply to “Janet Cardiff: Time-travel via sonic waves”

  1. Good piece but I do have some suggestions. When you compare Janet Cardiff’s work to Bill Fontana, you should say specifically how they are different (or similar) and refer to examples in their work that illustrate your point. Also, when you say that Janet Cardiff’s work incorporates a form of augmented reality, you could again, give some examples. I like very much how you take us through the Forest work, and you could have done that first, and then used this piece to explain the assertions you make in the essay as mentioned.

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