SPEED OF SILENCE is a chronicle in pictures and sounds of the passing of the world as we move through it. Photographs in the show and book derive from a 13,000-mile road trip through 37 of the United States undertaken in fall 2020, in the depths of the Covid pandemic. Empty towns and landscapes full of slipping silence. Darkness arising out of the blurring, fading light, going by in a heartbeat. What is the sound of things as they disappear?
Artist Statement:
Some of these images come from a 13,000-mile road trip through 37 of the United States undertaken in fall 2020, in the depths of the Covid pandemic. Empty towns and landscapes full of slipping silence. Darkness arising out of the blurring, fading light, going by in a heartbeat. What is the sound of things as they disappear?
My principal goal with photography has been, always, to frame an armature of energies in dynamic interplay. These are not records of events or people, or views of the past, nor are they meant to foster a specific response or conclusion. They are states, to be experienced fresh upon each viewing.
Tom Djll’s electronic music compositions for the SPEED OF SILENCE book were developed alongside the photographs with the intention of presenting the sonics with the visuals. An immersive synaesthetic experience, without computer screens.
Local musician, teacher, printer and raconteur Gino Robair will put Djll on the witness stand to try to unearth his ideas around sound, silence, and images, and perhaps demonstrate his wicked John Cage impersonation. To round out the evening, the acoustic trio Brittle Feebling will play a set of improvisations that further blur the boundaries of sound, silence, gesture, and agency. Brittle Feebling consists of Kanoko Nishi-Smith, koto; Jacob Felix Heule, bass drum and cymbals; and Tom Djll on trumpet with attachments and deconstructions.