Bottled Up: Hearing the Unheard

Delving into the dark recesses of violence that lives in plain sight, an evening of sonic explorations will interpret and reimagine academic research from criminologists and sociologists.

Hearing the Unheard, part of the Sites of Violence project, will merge artistic and academic understandings of human and non-human experiences of violence, and the processes, emotions, and meaning that this violence reveals. In this 90-minute concert event, enjoy three performances by leading Australian musicians. Please note tickets are $20.

Gothic Dislocation 

Heather Shannon is currently researching the Australian Gothic and is interested in issues of dislocation and alienation within the Australian environment. Day at the Beach and Strange Roses were developed in response to Christine Winter’s paper: “Does time colonise intergenerational environmental justice theory?”. Winter discusses the limitations of European ideas of time as linear, contrasting this with the grounding force of spirally bound time of the Māori people “for whom nonhuman and human are entangled within the spheres of justice.” There is a strong sense of sequential movement in the harmonic structures of classical music, of forward propulsion and linear direction. These compositions resist forward motion in their ambience and stillness. They instead hang back, suspended by dislocation.

Heather Shannon, Composer, Musician and Teacher

Christine Winter, Department of Government and International Relations, University of Sydney

I Make What I Don’t Want to Hear

In this performance lecture to herself, Alexis explores the motives behind her own composing process. I Make What I Don’t Want to Hear will cover the relationship between sound art, childhood fears which carry into adulthood, the sounds we make and those we hear in nature. Alexis uses words as well as electronic and performed sound to share her findings with the audience.

Alexis Weaver, Composer, Musician and Researcher

The Dream Test

The Dream Test text draws on Carolyn McKay’s criminological research into the cheap motel room as a site of crime, the subject of her draft book, The Crime Scene Motel Project. Carolyn has stayed in many decaying, suburban motels where crimes have been committed, to investigate these mundane sites through the lens of her visual arts practice and ‘ghost criminological’ imaginings. This performance is inspired by a mid-century artwork, designed by Tibor Reich, that Carolyn found hanging above the bed in one motel where a series of eerie, supernatural-inspired sexual assaults had occurred. McKay’s text will be augmented with live improvisations by a trio of experimental soundmakers: Jim Denley, Romy Caen and Jacques Emery, creating an immersive, mysterious atmosphere.

Carolyn McKay, Sydney Law School, University of Sydney

Jim Denley, Composer and Musician

Romy Caen, Event Organiser, Studio Manager and Musician

Jacques Emery, Composer and Musician

This event is part of The Living Room Theatre’s Bottled Up Micro-festival curated by Michelle St Anne and Jacques Emery in partnership with the Sydney Environment Institute and City of Sydney. A series of theatrical sound nights, academic panels and artist talks that explore themes of violence against women and the environment.