In the small village of Benești, a few hours’ drive West of Bucharest, locals use horse-drawn carts to go to the fields. They return with freshly cut hay or sand from the riverbed. Coachmen talk to their horses in order to indicate which directions to follow and the appropriate speed. “Dii” to move forward, “Hai” to go faster, “O” to stop. I’ve invited myself with the microphones on board for a ride. Communication runs through sounds and gestures, which in my lack of understanding Romanian language turn horse talk into universal language. Each in their own manner, man and animal, seem to understand each other. Voice speaks beyond words, inviting us to listen to timbre, rhythms and melodies that intertwine as they are spoken.
With the voices of Titel, Daniel, Ionel, as well as Anamaria, Laurențiu, Mara, Maria, Octav, Simina and Zsolt.
Photo: Nicu Ilfoveanu
Sound piece created during the SONIC FUTURE RESIDENCIES organized by Asociația Jumătatea plină and SEMI SILENT to Conacul Otetelișanu, Vâlcea County, Romania in July 2018.
*
Félix Blume is a sound artist and sound engineer. He currently works and lives between Mexico and France. His personal work is based on field-recordings using sound as a basic material, in sound pieces, videos, actions and installations. He works with communities in the public space. In his pieces, he blurs the line between sounds and music by changing noise in sounds that eventually sheds a new light on the perception of the surrounding sounds. The particularity of his work is that the audio and visual aspects are closely intertwined. His sound pieces were broadcast in galleries and radios from all over the world: Arte Radio (FR), Kunst Radio (AT), Deutschland Radio Kultur (DE), Radio Nacional de Espana (ES), Phaune Radio (FR), ABC Radio (AU), Radio Panik (BE), Radio Grenouille (FR) among others, as well as in different spaces such as Centre Pompidou and Musée d’Orsay. His work „Los Gritos de Mexico” was granted the „Pierre Schaeffer” award in the French festival Phonurgia (Paris) and an honorific mention in the Bienal de Radio in Mexico City.
www.felixblume.com
Recording, editing and mixing by Félix Blume for SEMI SILENT
Horses Talk was granted the SEMI SILENT Award 2019 and the BRONZE trophy in the Short Form category at Grand Prix Nova 2019.
