Photo: Elliott Jerome Brown Jr. for the New York Times.
Recently, the New York City subway system featured an audio-based public art project by Chloë Bass. Composer Jeremy Toussaint-Baptiste created the distinctive sound that starts each announcement. His shirt says, “If you see something, free something.”
In September and October, the New York City subway system, the MTA, had some fun with an art installation that involved the public address system. If you’ve ever traveled underground in New York, you know that there is art everywhere, some of it permanent, like mosaics, others ephemeral like this one.
Aruna D’Souza announced it at the New York Times: “Through Oct. 5, commuters making their way through the crowds at 14 subway stations throughout New York may notice a new type of announcement on the public address system. ‘What we hear changes how we feel. How we feel changes what we do. And what we do changes the world around us, even if just for a moment,’ one says.
“Some sound like snippets of overheard conversations: ‘Remember when Aretha Franklin died and people were singing her songs together on crowded train cars?’
“Each will end with the words ‘If you hear something, free something,’ which is also the title of this ambitious public art project by the conceptual artist Chloë Bass. …
“Bass turns around the instruction to be ever-vigilant in the face of threat, coaxing us instead ‘to return to ourselves in public space, and to experience it as a place where we engage with others instead of only being suspicious of others.’
“The project is a collaboration among Bass, the public art organization Creative Time and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s Arts & Design department. The M.T.A. has had a robust public art program over the years … but this is the first time they’ve allowed an artist to broadcast over the M.T.A.’s public address system.
“The 10- to 45-second announcements, 24 in all, will be aired in English, Spanish, Arabic, Bangla, Haitian Kreyòl, and Mandarin — six of the top 10 commonly spoken languages in New York City. (ASL translations will also be available on the Creative Time website.)
They are voiced by a range of vocalists, assembled in part through an on-the-street casting of regular New Yorkers. …
“Bass, 41, conceived the project over the course of her long train and bus commutes between Brooklyn and Queens College, where she taught in the visual arts program for more than eight years. [She says] ‘after 2016, there were more and more announcements, and they were really wrecking my emotional landscape.’
While broadcasts conveying basic information or emergency instructions were understandable and necessary, she said the constant reminders of police presence and increasingly frequent attempts to shape people’s behavior disrupted her thoughts. ‘We’re constantly being asked to internalize the idea that we are supposed to be watchful over each other, not in a supportive or caring way, but to report things to someone else,’ she said. …
“Diya Vij, curator at Creative Time, said that when she and Bass started thinking about what the project could achieve, they realized ‘it could help people see themselves and each other again and think about being neighbors and community differently in a space that might feel more tense than it should.’ …
“In addition to voices, the messages include sonic elements made in collaboration with the musician Jeremy Toussaint-Baptiste, who created the musical tone that opens each. (It draws in part from Bass’s research into the healing qualities of certain frequencies.)
“Before writing the scripts, Bass convened a series of focus groups composed of commuters, M.T.A. employees, transportation advocates and teenagers. (‘Large groups of teens are everybody’s subway nightmare, but they’re New Yorkers, too,’ she said.)
“Maggie Murtha, part of the project team at the M.T.A., said one of her takeaways from the focus groups was that ‘there was a longing to feel connected to the people around you.’ ”
More at the Times, here.
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