- Dates:
4 May - 1 June 2017
This year’s competition attracted over 130 works from 33 countries from around the world, including France, Mexico, Portugal, South Korea, Finland, and the United States, as well as several UK artists. 20 finalists were selected by a panel of judges The Wire publisher Tony Herrington, sound artist and composer Dr Annie Mahtani, and sound artist Janek Schaefer. The works selected included sounds sampled from news reports and archived footage, installations that generate sound through resonance, and even some that can be described as “silent sound art”.
Prize Winner: Shadowland – Laura Daly (UK)
Selected Finalists: William Aikman (UK), Mathevet Frédéric (France), Amirabbas Mohammadi (Iran), Simon Bennison (UK), John Grieve (UK), Chris Pulley (USA), Liliana & Rui Carvalho (Portugal/UK), Myungduk Kim (South Korea), Alexandra Spence (Australia), Jason Charney (USA), Dan Knight (UK), Jojo Taylor (UK), George Cloke (UK), Otso Lähdeoja (Finland), Xavier Velastin (UK), Dirk D’Hulster (Belgium), Nolan Lem (USA), Samantha Taylor & Phil Wilson-Perkin (UK), Laura Daly (UK), Mara Marxt Lewis (Austria), & Tyler Lewis (USA).
Commissioned Artists: Tim Murray-Browne and Aphra Shemza.
Post-Truth and Beauty – Engine Room 2017 Commission Post-Truth and Beauty creates an immediate sensory analogue of the evolving, multi-faceted, ungraspable nature of truth. It responds to a post- Brexit, mid-Trump descent across the political spectrum into tribalist discourse of labels and otherness. It aims to provoke the audience to question how authority, power, evidence and truth relate. Visitors are invited into a ring of eight speakers adjacent to a structure of interweaving luminescent rods. Inside, a 3D camera tracks their body to control sound and light. As they move, different perspectives onto an intangible abstract landscape emerge. The work guides the visitor towards physical positions where the artist has crafted specific perspectives onto the audio-visual scene. These ‘sweet spots’ create a non-linear narrative of partial glimpses into an ungraspable truth.
The competition and exhibition were supported by The Wire, IKLECTIK, HHB, Academia, Genelec, and Bigger Boat Distribution.