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'Idle Chatter' exhibit relies on audiences to phone it in

Posted 3/22/2011

The Vanderbilt University Department of Art in association with The Office of Arts and Creative Engagement presents a new work by The Art Guys: Idle Chatter.
 
Idle Chatter is an audio sculpture that invites everyone on the Vanderbilt campus and audiences from all over the world to participate. It will take place and also be on display from Tues., March 22 until Tues., April 5.  An opening reception at Vanderbilt’s Space 204 will be held on Tuesday, March 22, from 4 to 6 pm. Everyone attended is encouraged to remember their cell phones!
 
For Idle Chatter, participants are invited to call a prescribed number – 615-343-7000 – at anytime and from anywhere. This telephone number, provided by the university, connects callers to an extension inside the
Space 204 gallery. When connected, the voices and sounds of these callers are broadcast live throughout the gallery space from digital answering devices set on speaker mode. Callers may say or do anything they wish. They are in control, they are the exhibition, this is their soapbox.
 
Idle Chatter addresses and plays with the phenomenon of the ubiquity of telephones in everyday life. The materials of this sculptural arrangement are the ephemeral voices and sounds of the callers which are transmitted from remote locations to the exhibition space. The intention is not to create a dialog. The devices in the gallery space will not be formatted to be used by gallery visitors.  Nor is the purpose of Idle Chatter to demonstrate the sophistication of any technology. Rather, it is to create a simple social sculpture, an electronic soapbox, a situation in which the art is shaped and determined by audience members themselves using everyday materials and techniques.
 
Space 204 is located on the second floor of the E. Bronson Ingram Studio Art Center, 25th and Garland on the Vanderbilt campus. Gallery hours are Monday through Friday, 10 am to 4 pm. The gallery is free and open to the public.

Contact: The Department of Art at 615-343-7241