WhisperSHOUTING Echo

In my ongoing work I seek to explore echo as a feminist and decolonial figuration, drawing on sonic knowledge production within the field of archaeoacoustics. In this presentation, I revisit an artist residency I undertook in Beijing in 2015. During this time I made several visits to the Imperial Vault of Heaven, in Beijing's Temple of Heaven (1530; rebuilt 1572) attempting to experience its well-known acoustic properties, most famously the smooth round Echo Wall, but also the Three Sound Stones and the Dialogue Stone. Confronted with the overwhelming volume of Beijing’s booming tourism industry each time, my endeavour to sound out any potentially sacred acoustics for myself failed. In this presentation, I give space to a ‘right to opacity’ but seek to speculatively explore what understanding echo(es) might mean in this context.