Following on from Marinetti’s sound poems I’m reminded of Christian Marclay’s Manga Scroll, which also highlights the materiality of the voice through the use of onomatopoeia. As far as I can tell, unlike the futurists Marclay thankfully isn’t using these scripts to forward a fascist agenda, instead it appears he’s trying to draw our attention towards the way in which the materiality of the world is organised through the range of the human voice. While writers such as Foucault have argued it’s through language that we order our experience of the world. What about all of those vocalisations which exist outside or on the cusp of language. We’re born into bodies with ears which prioritise the frequencies of human speech, and in this way our experience of all sounds (not only language) is ordered through that sonic range; all within a reference frame tuned to the voice. This is why the wind howls, the ship groans and fingernails on a blackboard shriek.

With regards to the two performances, I was captivated by just how bombastic both Joan La Barbara’s and Theo Blekmann’s renditions are. If you’re going to implicate your own body into a work, in a way which questions our material relationship to the world, all the better to take it to the limit! Make us aware of where the edges are.

Barbara. J. L. (2010). Manga Scroll. [Extended voice performance]. New York, USA. Accessed 13/08/2019. https://youtu.be/SqtGrpjI9Yw

Bleckmann. T. (2010). Manga Scroll. [Extended voice performance]. New York, USA. Accessed 13/08/2019. https://youtu.be/k8goKkTGJqI

Marclay. C. (2010). Manga Scroll. [Lithographic print 19″ x 3″ x 3″]. London, UK.

Image: https://graphicstudiousf.wordpress.com

Categories: Language / Voice as Material / Processed Voice