laire Staebler reports on the serious artistic update given to the cozy nostalgic world of radio at radiodays.org, which is broadcasting over the internet for 26 days from De Appel Stichting and includes curatorial work by Rael Artel, Kathrin Jentjens, Jelena Vesic, Huib van der Werf and Veronica Wiman as well as Claire herself. Internet and digital capabilities have not left the world of radio alone of course. We remember the fi rst time we listened to New York radio live here in Paris over an early broadband connection- hairs stood up all over the place. And a lot has sure happened since then. So here’s Claire’s take on this audio enterprise.
“art is only an excuse to have a dialogue.”
Radiodays.org In 1938, just a day before Halloween, millions of Americans tuned in to a popular radio program that featured plays directed by Orson Welles. The performance that evening was an adaptation of the science fi ction novel The War of the Worlds. In only a few minutes Orson Wells created a movement of panic in the United States about a potential Martian invasion of the earth. This popular and mythical example shows us the impact and the popularity of the radio as a medium and the « magic » aspect of the sound. Nostalgic, non-visible, free, the radio offers a singular perception of space through the sculptural quality of sound. A singing exhibition, a city walk, a radio robot talk show, a ghostly talk about fantoms on the waves or a sound performance by James Beckett or a sound track of a video… From Micol Assaël to On Kawara, Radiodays wants to bring together a selection of projects which deal with the action of listening and requiring memory and imagination. Radiodays tries to explore and articulate a different fomat for a radio programme based on specifi c works, historical archives and a series of interviews, talks and forum. Thus, the radio operates as a kind of satellite, a spot for production and broadcast and creates the opportunity to open a new space between the private and the public spheres where the curators become moderators, selectors, and producers of a series of encounters. In a way, Radiodays is, as well, the consequence and the result of a generational and cultural phenomenon: today with the culture of home studio, the generation of MP3, the digital camera and the image of the anonymous DJ as a hero, everybody can become a novice producer of sound and video at home: in the intimity of our room we are all producers.
www.radiodays.org
CLAIRE STAEBLER, Paris.
onestar press
Radiodays, what happens when viewers become listeners ?
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