This message has no body text. 2021
Acrylic, vinyl, water, speakers
Variable. 2:29

This work explores disembodied speech and the possibility of severing voice from its source. I’m often told that my voice isn’t ‘neutral, that it carries inflections that reveal me. In response, I attempted to mimic auto-generated voices: the ones used in terminal announcements, by machines, or in tones of authority. I intended this imitation to act as a layer of opacity, a shroud. But instead, it continued to expose the person behind the voice. This led me to reflect on the kinds of voices that can claim invisibility and disavow their origins, those typically associated with ‘observer-narrators’ or filmic voiceovers.

I also split the voice into two channels, a conversation between the left and right. The work was installed using separate speakers in two identical, opposing rooms. The content of this conversation was a poetic meditation on a bodiless message, an alert sent almost benevolently by mailing services meant to draw attention to human error. The sculpture, meanwhile, has a ‘body’ of water that comes alive as sound ripples through it. The video documents the movement of the water in response to the sound’s frequencies.