Memory and the anthropological place: Re-constructing space and place through physical and imaginary sound walks.

 

Maria Maltézou

Open Scores Lab, Bath Spa University, U.K., maria.maltezou18@bathspa.ac.uk.

 

This auto-topographical project was created as a response to Marc Augé’s book Non-Places (1992) as a way to explore the terms ‘place’ as a lived space concerned with history and identity, and ‘space’ as a generic, non-symbolised location. The questions I intended to answer focus on the identity of the residents-performers and their relationship with the built environment, and the differences between their experience and a visitor’s perspective, which is characterised by disorientation and lack of links with the place. Concurrently, I examined the representation of the anthropological place in sound- based arts using memory and reconnection with the place as a driving force, and the role architecture plays in our daily, time-controlled tasks as a formal aspect and storytelling method.

 

The paper explores the role architecture plays in our routine, drawing on a related piece in two parts: Artificial Environments, a sound walk that took place in Corfu (Greece) in August and September 2018, and In Defence, a game for trombone and non-musical objects which is based on recorded material from the sound walk. In Artificial Environments the participants are asked to record the soundscape, take some pictures and keep notes related to what they can hear and see, as well as any memories and thoughts they would like to share. This way they are creating their version of the place and new memories in it and manage to turn the selective, inaccurate map into an experience, the abstract space into a lived place. In the second part, In Defence, the performer’s memory of Corfu town is used to recreate it and perform an imaginary walk in it using sound as narrative. The material for this part came mainly from the recordings for Artificial Environments, translated for trombone. In Defence was composed particularly for a musician who was brought up in the town of Corfu, but moved away several years ago, mirroring my own experience. My goal was to examine our ever-hanging identity connected to our relationship with each space, as well as our memory and reconnection with it, and the way our human-made surroundings form our routines and habits. The two parts are different representations of the work and different views of the town of Corfu.