2008
Archive La Menil Foundation:
“Although I work with sound, I don’t make music. I build entities with sound. And this entity is as much an entity as a piece of bronze sculpture, as a piece of steel sculpture, as a painting... In one sense, it’s very fragile. If you unplug it, whsst! It’s gone. But in the other sense, it’s more robust, because you have a document that you can always make it again. So it’s this kind of contradiction.”
Max Neuhaus
https://whitneymedia.org/assets/generic_file/623/adp-pressrelease.pdf
On May 2, 2008, Max Neuhaus discussed his site-specific sound installation,
Sound Figure (2007), at the Menil Collection in Houston. He also took part in other recorded conversations related to the work, which was inaugurated at the museum's entrance around that time.
Discussion of Sound Figure
The discussion was part of the Menil's Artists Documentation Program and was archived by the Menil Collection. Neuhaus's conversation likely focused on his artistic philosophy and the conceptual basis for this specific work, which is permanently installed in the walkway outside the museum's entrance.
Key points from his discussion, as reflected in quotations and records, include:
- Creating "entities with sound": Neuhaus famously explained, "Although I work with sound, I don't make music. I build entities with sound". He viewed Sound Figure not as a musical performance, but as a robust, non-visual sculpture made of sound.
- The work is an invisible, yet distinct, "sound shape"—a spatially contained aural field that redefines the passageway into the museum. It is meant to be quietly and subtly discovered by visitors.
- Permanence versus fragility: During the discussion, Neuhaus commented on the contradictory nature of his sound art, stating, "In one sense, it's very fragile. If you unplug it, whsst! It's gone. But in the other sense, it's more robust, because you have a document that you can always make it again".
- Conservation and technology: Conservation efforts for Sound Figure after Neuhaus's death highlighted the challenges of preserving his technological sound works, as described in a later presentation on the piece.