audio artist brenda hutchinson recently set out on a cross-country drive with a large cast-iron bell in tow. no, really. ms hutchinson (who some years ago made a radio documentary about driving her piano across the country, in a u-haul) is en route from brooklyn, MI to new york to san francisco. along the way she'll ring the bell, allow it to ring as she drives, stop in variously sized towns and invite others to ring the bell, and collect bell-related stories and associations from whoever wishes to tell them. she'll arrive in SF just in time for the opening of an exhibit at the exploratorium called "listen: making sense of sound", and the bell will then take up permanent residence there, where it will ring as the exploratorium opens and closes each day.this is the kind of project that makes my heart shake. i'd give anything to drive across america, (or new zealand) making a lot of beautiful noise and engaging people in conversations about sound, or anything else for that matter. best of luck to brenda, and i hope you'll keep an eye/ear out for her and the bell, which may be rolling down your street when you least expect it.
keep track of brenda's adventures here. and in the spirit of her endeavors, who's got a good bell story to share?
2 comments:
No bell story, but yesterday on the 66 bus, a man's cell phone meowed.
Now there's a ringtone I can get behind.
speaking of ringtones, across a sea of cubicles yesterday i suddenly heard a very annoying, impatient, mechanical sounding woman say "your phone's ringing. are you going to pick it up?" then a pause. then "your PHONE is RINGING" then a pause. then again. "your PHONE is RINGING.' then i heard somebody say "hello?" and realized that the imploring 'pick up your phone' voice was actually a ringtone.
why would you program a personal device to yell at you? puzzling...
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