Highlight: Iain Forsyth & Jane Pollard: Silent Sound
Silent Sound, Performance Still. Photo copyright Anne Worthington.
Middlesbrough Town Hall
Sun 7th March, Doors 6:00pm. Performance 6:30-7:30pm
Created by visual artists Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard, Silent Sound is a unique experiment in transmitting subliminal messages during a live music performance. To make this remarkable project, the artists joined forces with acclaimed musician Jason Pierce (Spiritualized), who created a new orchestral score, and leading parapsychologist Dr Ciarán O’Keeffe (TV’s Most Haunted). Both will be present at the event.
Silent Sound is part classical concert and part public séance. It draws on the powerful psychological set-up of 19th century Spiritualist performances and is inspired in part by Victorian entertainers The Davenport Brothers, who were famed for attempting to contact the souls of the dead using their ‘spirit cabinet’.
The possibility of communication with the dead has long been part of the human story, taking different forms depending on the era or culture: medium, shaman, prophet, healer or mystic. Scientific innovators like Thomas Edison believed that we never really die, but that our soul is made up of indestructible particles that retain our full memory and personality.
During the live performance, Forsyth and Pollard sit inside a specially created soundproof cabinet based on the ‘spirit cabinet’ from where they repeat a spoken message that is attempted to be transmitted subliminally via their Silent Sound Machine throughout the live music performance.
Silent Sound has been specially adapted for Middlesbrough Town Hall, a building with its own haunted history. It was first commissioned by A Foundation and presented during the Liverpool Biennial (2006).
Click the image below for venue information and to book tickets.
A FREE Festival coach departs from Newcastle Central Station at 5:00pm and departs Middlesbrough at 8:00pm. For details and to reserve a seat email reservations@avfestival.co.uk
