2014
In his essay “Musique en fer forgé: Erik Satie, Le Corbusier and the Problem of Aural Architecture,” (published in Abstract 2008-2009 and discussed in related architectural theory), James Graham positions Max Neuhaus as the modern successor to the concept of "furniture music" (musique d’ameublement).
Graham links Neuhaus to the evolution of Aural Architecture through several key points:
Graham argues that while Satie proposed music as a decorative, atmospheric backdrop (like wallpaper), Neuhaus transformed this into a structural material. Neuhaus's installations, such as his permanent work at the Dia Art Foundation’s Times Square site, function as "aural ironwork"—invisible but rigid structures that define urban space.
Much like Le Corbusier used physical materials to dictate movement, Graham suggests Neuhaus uses sound to "partition" the city. This aligns with Blake Johnston’s "metaperceptual" approach, where the listener discovers "walls" and "zones" made of sound that are only perceived through the body's movement.
Graham explores the "problem" that sound art poses to traditional architecture: it is an architecture without mass. Neuhaus is cited as the artist who solved this by creating site-specific sound topographies that possess the permanence and spatial presence of a building, yet remain entirely ephemeral and invisible.
Similar to David Grubbs’ critique of recording, Graham emphasizes that Neuhaus’s "ironwork" cannot be moved or recorded because it is embedded in the specific acoustic geometry of the architecture it inhabits