installation with two channel audio, water, buckets, sinks, and a metal threshold
location: Art-O-Matic 2004 group exhibition in the old Children's Museum building. The site-specific installation was made in a room that was tiled, wall-to-wall, ceiling to floor. Two metal sinks were in the room prior to the installation, originally used for staging cleaning.
For the installation I installed 1.5" high metal threshold three feet into the room from the doorway. The sinks were plugged and filled with water to the very edge of the meniscus. Water, a 1 1/4 in high, was on the floor, almost reaching the top of the threshold. The room was dark, with the windows blackened out. The room was next to the boiler room, thus there was a heat within the room that made a musty odor, and created a relationship with the water in the room, an evaporation/condensation loop. The sink in the back of the room opposite to the doorway was on with a slow, steady, audible drip. Two buckets were placed underneath the other sink, each containing the units for projecting the sound of the audio pieces. The channel 1 audio file was the recording of a male computer voice reading the following statements: "I miss you." "I want you." "I love you." "I need you." The channel 2 audio file was my recorded voice uttering the same phrases, in no particular order, with varying emotive qualities (for example, sometimes the phrase "I miss you" sounded desperate, and sometimes it sounded needy and whiny; "I love you" sounded playful, and also at times threatening). Sometimes the two channels seemed to synch up, with a phrase from channel 1 answering the previous phrase of channel 2.
The installation lasted for eight days and the audio could be heard down the hallway of the building, drawing visitors in and the water on the floor surprising some visitors as they stepped over the threshold, not seeing the water in the dark.