Listening Post- Looking Outwards 01

Listening Post is an interactive installation that generates random words and phrases from Internet chat rooms. These words (most introducing oneself) appears on more than 200 LED screens which light up the dark room with viewers in front of them. These words are spoken by a male computer voice emanating from speakers. The work magically combines simple instructions like “I am hot” to some heavier topics like whether “I am doing fine”. This project mainly involves two artists, namely, Mark Hansen and Ben Rubin. The project is installed in Whitney Museum. The project was first inspired by works of John Cage, Philip Glass and Jenny Holzer. For the technology side, the technological advances in data-mining techniques have made a distinct turning-point. To gather the data, Hansen and Rubin created a program that collects and identifies key information of all the phrases from chat rooms and other virtual spaces. Not only the phrases and data are generated through a computer program, but also the male voice.

This project is so interesting and unpredictable as some phrases may connect to the next one and makes sense to the audience. It has raised “the worldwide protests against the pending American invasion of Iraq, it was startling to witness the appearance of a phrase such as ‘I am a Muslim and am afraid of nothing’, which could have been intended as stoicism or aggression ” (Eleey, 2003). The whole installation composed fear, happiness, pleasure, power, and etc.

Listening Post