Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller

Since the mid-1990s, the Canadian visual artists Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller have been exploring the sculptural and physical qualities of sound. Their new work, entitled The Murder of Crows, is their largest audio installation to date. A total of 98 speakers will be set up in the exhibition space of the Hamburger Bahnhof museum for contemporary art in Berlin. The sounds of voices, instruments and sonic environments, produced by a special stereophonic recording and playback system, will be channelled through the speakers, creating a composition that addresses the listener in a very direct and physical manner. The special ambisonic surround sound system enhances spatial sound perception, physically enveloping the listener in a moving field of sound and music. The installation is structured like a play or film, but with images and narrative that are created by voice, music and sound effects alone. The piece was produced in collaboration with the composers Freida Abtan and Tilman Ritter and lasts around thirty minutes.

The title of the installation The Murder of Crows alludes to the traditional term for a flock of crows and the uncanny event known as a “crow funeral”, in which many crows gather together upon the death of one of their number and caw a lament for the dead, sometimes for periods of more than twenty-four hours. Another major reference is Goya’s The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters – from the series of etchings called Caprichos, dating from 1799. The political dimension of both of these reference points subsequently lays the thematic groundwork for the installation.

The Murder of Crows exhibition in Hamburger Bahnhof is held as part of an ongoing programme of events that feature musical works by visual artists. The project, which was launched in 1999, is a collaboration between the Berlin music lovers’ association Freunde Guter Musik Berlin, the Nationalgalerie in Hamburger Bahnhof, and, from 2002 to date, MaerzMusik – the Berliner Festspiele festival of contemporary music. The Murder of Crows was commissioned by Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary in Vienna for the Sydney Biennale 2008 where it was exhibited to great acclaim.