© Tamara Wilhelm
The sound installation shifts the sound almost entirely into the viewers’ imagination. The imagination – the realm of ultimate intimacy, unobservable, immediate and incommunicable, uncontrollable, and eminently private.
Memories of the sound of rustling leaves and twigs are called to mind. Parts of an indoor plant are moved by devices powered by solar cells and vibration motors in an unpredictable time sequence. It is as if we are looking at clouds drifting by, fire, embers, or flowing water. Uncoupled from the vital process of decoding semantic interrelationships, this act of observation puts us into a state of absent-mindedness, triggers free association, conjures up illusions and images. The actual rhythmic sound pattern arising from the rustling of the leaves is minimal; the rest takes place in the intimate realm of the observer’s brain.