research based, performative,  sound, site-specific installation

2017

18 channel sound installation with 4 channel video with the subtitles (German and English)

The installation Conversations WMW is composed out of visual elements of all already existing versions from the series Conversations: Hula-hoops, Elastics, Marbles and Sand (Russia, Serbia, Azerbaijan, Iran, Austria and Israel), together with specially made 18 channel sound installation with 4 channel video with the subtitles (German and English).
Before entering the room, the visitor is visually confronted with the colorful wall made out of 32 Alphabet Cubes (Azerbaijani Version), not being able to see the space. Going behind the wall, one will find a big plane (55m2) covered with cardboard, that is carrying the circle with 30777 glass marbles (Serbian Version) while penetrating the enlarged (30m2) Sand Box (Iranian Version). One of the options to climb up to the platform is by walking on the ramp made out of the black school board with painted Hopscotch on it (Russian Version), supported by some of the sticks from the Mikado Spiel (Austrian Version). Another possibility is to step onto some of the leftover Alphabet Cubes spread around the platform.
The visitor is free to walk around, climb on the playground, sit at the frame of the Sand Box, observe and listen to the conversations of 18 selected children from 6 countries, which is presented as 18 channel sound installation synchronized with German and English subtitles, projected on 4 walls of the room. Listening to the sound of the installation, the spectator has the impression that he/she is listening to a conversation between these 18 children coming from 6 different countries speaking Russian, Serbian, Azeri, Farsi, German, Hebrew, and Arabic.
Some of the Concrete replicas of Shelters from the Israeli Version are used as supporters of the platform, as well as spread around the playground, in order to sit on them as well as on some of the Alphabet cubes and Mikado Spiel box.
In the visual articulation of the sound installations, the accent is put on the tension in between the “naivety” of the children and the “seriousness” of the political context, which is to be found in the background of each specific society where the work is being produced.
The audio part is made out of the recordings of interviews with children from the already produced versions from the series Conversations in these six respective countries.

Excerpt from the text Child of the Universe: Objectivity at the Threshold of Individuation (2017) by Mohammad Salemy

Here you can hear/ see the entire sound installation in Russian, Serbian, Azeri, Farsi, German, Hebrew and Arabic with English subtitles: