Sound Installation
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Feedback
Traveling exhibition Dhaka-Berlin
Curated by Birga Meyer, Promona Sengupta, and Tanvir Alim.
Schwules Museum
Material: Loop, 27min 37seg, two tweeter speakers, amplifier, 3D printing, USB, sound composition.
The tiny sound sculpture simulated an archival box that disrupted the quietness, calmness, and perceived silence often associated with institutional archives. Through this subtle intervention, it challenged the notion that archives are inert or voiceless spaces. In concrete terms, the sounds were triggered by forms of patterns, trends, and data related to HIV/AIDS from 1981 to 1991. These sonic impulses refer to data extracted from a report published in the magazine AIDS Feedback, a rare publication documenting the early years of the epidemic. In this work, the artist activates and reinterprets archival material from the Schwules Museum in Berlin, focusing on statistics and timelines surrounding the HIV/AIDS crisis. By translating this data into sound, the artist invites a form of listening that reanimates historical trauma and queer loss.
Samuel’s ongoing artistic and academic research explores how listening can become a method for engaging with the archival traces of HIV/AIDS. Their work proposes that one can witness AIDS not only through images and texts but also by the ear. This project aimed to enact a form of shared listening and collective memory within the Sweetmeet Dahka/Berlin group of artists, creating a space for sounding grief, resistance, and the intergenerational sharing on how to still make sound in relation to the epidemic of HIV/AIDs.