Sound Work Location: Locmine, France, Dimensions: 120 x 200 meters, Proposed: 1985
Image: Max Neuhaus Drawing, Domaine de Kerguehennec, 1986 - Ink and colored pencil on paper -96 x 96 cm. Collection: The Estate of Max Neuhaus
MNE-DRAW (Untitled) Domaine de Kerguehennec, 1987.pdf
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Domaine de Kerguehennec
'Walking/ between/ moving/ water/ and/ still./ Meeting/ a quiet/ body of sound/ shifting on the still/ water/ surface./ Enclosed by/ a lucent/ sheen'.
This verbal evocation of a sound work to be maintained until 1998 at the Domaine de Kerguehennec in France is accompanied on one side by shivery lines in greens and blues and on the other by more irregular marks like reflections on water. Edge is offset by surface, and both directionality and extent are interpreted in early Modernist terms, as a parallel between ripples and sound waves (though far from diagrammatic, the drawings still impart information about texture and extent). At the same time, as Neuhaus has remarked, they become part of the process of perception of his sounds. Neuhaus has strong views about that process. Objecting to decoration with sound the arbitrariness of the choice of music in public places he aims at specificity, a heightening and clarification of existing possibilities, in this case natural. The effect is to stress elements which are partly directional, partly indicative of extent, but also partly descriptive. Choice of size, colour and application is crucial, and as a reminder of that, several first drafts of drawings are shown in order to indicate the number and type of decisions that arose in the course of their making.
BY STUART MORGAN IN REVIEWS | 11 SEP 95
denys-zacharopoulos, "Max Neuhaus," in Max Neuhaus [French, English] (Locminé: Edition du Centre d'Art, Domaine de Kerguéhennec, 1987)
Image: Photo Max Neuhaus in situ,
Domaine de Kerguehennec. Collection: The Estate of Max Neuhaus
Photo© The Estate of Max Neuhaus