Birdbrain

Work in exhibition

Birdbrain looks at our relationship with urban crows/corvids and seagulls and explores our mixed relationship with these common noisy and highly intelligent birds through voice and language (animal/human), including the spoken and written word (human). While we admire these birds’ obvious abilities in terms of survival, intelligence and ingenuity we also feel threatened by these very attributes that we share with them.

The project consists of audiovisual installation work including field recordings, bird mimicry, spoken and written text as well as an artist’s book posing as a kind of mock field guide. Four performers and ten writers have contributed to the project.

The four performers are:
· Kate Hunter (PhD research candidate Victoria University, Melbourne, Australia)
· Vanessa Chapple (Performer, dramaturge and director, Melbourne, Australia)
· Penny Baron (Performer and director, Melbourne, Australia)
· Melissa Alley (Artist and performer, London, UK)

The ten writers are:
· Geraldine Barlow (Senior Curator, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia)
· Giovanni Aloi (St Mary University London and Editor of Antennae, UK)
· Steve Baker (Emeritus Professor of Art, University of Central Lancashire, UK)
· Clare Halstead (Arts writer, UK)
· Cathy Lane (Sound artist and co-director of CRISAP, London, UK)
· Andrew Whitehouse (Teaching Fellow, Dept of Anthropology, Univ of Aberdeen, UK)
· Robin Tassie (Writer, UK)
· Michele Faguet (Arts writer, Berlin, Germany)
· Jessica Ullrich (Universitat der Kunst, Berlin, Germany)
· Rene ten Bos (Prof of Philosophy/Organisational Theory, Radboud Univ, Holland)

• http://www.soundfjord.org/galleryexhibit...
• http://www.emerson-gallery.de/index.php?...