Electroshock art at gallery

By Marc Losier

We live in a world where the need for physical interaction is being overtaken by convenience. Why go out when you can visit your local chat room? Why hold a meeting when you can use have video conferencing? You don’t even need a phone to order pizza any more.

How isolating technologies have affected our daily lives, and our relationships, presented a challenge to French artist Lynn Pook. She came to Montreal last week as part of the Tracking the Traces exhibition at Concordia’s Leonard and Bina Ellen Art Gallery.

Pook’s brilliant installation À fleur de peau, which was on display in the gallery from March 2 to 12, explored the sense of touch, which she feels has been greatly affected by our increasing use of technology.

“In Western society, the human sense of touch has waned as modern telecommunications have progressed,” she said. “Virtual realities have given people new identities, and they’re losing their grip of themselves.”

Using a German synthesizer from the 1970s Pook composed “sonic textures.” These were then split up, programmed and amplified through non-membrane micro-speakers aimed at reaching areas of the body that rarely receive any physical contact.

With speakers drooping from the ceiling like spiders spooling their webs, Pook strapped me to her piece. Covered from temples to toes by 16 miniature speakers, I began slowly to experience blips and blurps bouncing from one extremity to the other.

Nerve endings started shooting signals across my body, which gyrated in a sort of electroshock therapy. Spreading exponentially, it formed a veritable network of electricity under my skin, a real sensory overload!

The sounds used are not so much heard as they are felt within the body. In this case, the human body is the artist’s canvas. This is rather daring, for it is not tangible or visual, nor does it give the participant control.

“I built a haptic experience that finds the participant and not the other way around,” Pook said.

À fleur de peau lasts approximately 10 minutes, yet its effect lasts much longer. It raises questions of our obsession with technology and convenience.

À fleur de peau is a truly marvellous artistic and inquisitive response to these developments. Unfortunately, it was on for 10 days only. Tracking the Traces continues at Gallery, however, until April 9.