HUSH

Hush began as a single sound sculpture containing one raw field recording I made on Fall Equinox, 2019. EE had recently happened and I wanted to capture the feeling that comes at the end of a summer well lived. The hum of cricket song interwoven with distant sheep bleating, the sound of airplanes enroute to their destinations; it was a perfect moment of quietude at the gateway to autumn. Looking back, there is an eerie prescience to this recording made months before the pandemic hit and the planes stopped flying overhead at all. We entered the Great Hush and my work evolved to reflect this. Hush became HUSH, a louder, amplified Quietude, just like what we were experiencing on the planet. It highlights the possibility that this crisis is an opportunity, a pregnant pause perhaps, space for reflection upon an experience that is both personal and universal. HUSH takes the form of the archetypal forest that is always on the edge of consciousness, beckoning us to enter its wild mystery. During the pandemic, I took great comfort in going to the woods. I would go there to gather the roots, branches and old-growth cedar elements for this installation. I desired solitude; with my family all home in lockdown, it was a place to listen within the stillness and sometimes, a place to sing. I went to the forest to seek my aloneness and to my surprise, what I actually found was a deep sense of connection.