Soundwalk Workshop, Engaging Urban Communities at Invisible Places 2017

On April 6, 2017 Amanda Gutierrez, Norman W. Long, and Eric Leonardson provide a workshop on public engagement in urban soundscape awareness based on their recent experience collaborating in the Night Out In The Parks soundwalk series and The 606 Soundscape Project. All three are MSAE members and teaching artists who use/explore/engage soundwalks in their socially engaged art practices.

Through listening exercises and dialogue participants will learn soundwalking as an ecological practice in a 3-hour workshop on the practical, sustainable implementation of artist-run organizations serving local communities based on recent experiences in Chicago and New York; Gutierrez, Long, and Leonardson will address these fundamental questions:

• How do soundwalks engage urban individuals and communities in soundscape awareness?
• How do soundwalks address and activate a city’s more vulnerable and underserved communities?
• How does knowledge transfer from artists to communities in soundwalking and soundscape awareness?
• To what extent can artists-as-social activists acquire public funding to effectively, ethically, and sustainably support acoustic ecology and soundwalking practices in cultural spheres driven by the commercialized, tourism

The workshop provides both practical and the poetic opportunities in group listening, reflection on the ecological practice of soundwalking, and practical strategies for engaging public awareness in the soundscape, here defined as any dynamic system mediated in sound between individuals and their environment.

Through listening, dialogue and responsive exercises workshop participants will learn strategies, not only for study, but also for activating communities. We will address benefits and pitfalls that can occur in government, civic and cultural partnerships that are necessary for sustainable professional research and meaningful shared creative social practice in contested spaces.

Invisible Places 2017 convenes scholars, artists and theoreticians on soundscape art and ecology to encourage and support to new perspectives about the complex relationships between landscapes and soundscapes, including the significance of acoustic ecology for all living organisms. A central topic to be discussed is the focused study and intentional stewardship of our sound heritage for the holistic evaluation of landscapes as a fundamental aspect of the evolution and survival of all species, and will have a great impact on the survival of many.

Presenters’ Biographies:

Norman W. Long is an artist and scholar working in electronic music, phonography, acoustic ecology and landscape design rooted in the African Diaspora. He holds degrees in studio art and landscape architecture, and has been producing and professionally exhibiting his art work since 1994. Notable projects and activities include Electro-Acoustic Dubcology and Chicago Phonography. More info at http://normanwlong.wixsite.com/soundartdesign

Amanda Gutierrez is an artist working visual art, video, sound, and performance. She teaches in the Department of Film, Video, New Media, and Animation at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and is a Ph.D. student in the University of Girona, in the Doctoral Programme in Humanities, Heritage, and Cultural Studies. More info at http://www.amandagutierrez.net/eng/bio-statement/

Eric Leonardson is a founder of the Midwest Society for Acoustic Ecology, regional chapter of the American Society for Acoustic Ecology. He serves as President of the World Forum for Acoustic Ecology, and teaches in the Department of Sound at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. More info at http://ericleonardson.org

This workshop is partially sponsored by the American Society for Acoustic Ecology. The 2016 Soundwalks in the Parks series and The 606 Soundscape Project was funded in part by the Chicago Park District and Trust for Public Lands, in partnership with Midwest Society for Acoustic Ecology, a regional chapter of the American Society for Acoustic Ecology.