Sonic Territories are works are centred on listening and sampled sound, experienced with and without technology, and audio storytelling that reimagines human and more-than-human spaces and places of the past, present and future. This body of work evolved from an international (Arts) Territory Exchange collaboration with German artist Didi Hock in 2017 called Fictional Territories #01, where a mix of sound ‘sketches’ were reimagined movements around our backyards into a sonorous piece of fiction. The result was a territory that can’t be defined, but a definition of territory as an area of creativity, with the territory emerging in the active experience of listening. This idea was extended to abandoned spaces and reimagining the future of places.
Sonic Territories: Wambuul, 2022 –
UPDATE: Stage 1 received Country Arts Support Program (CASP) funding through Orana Arts to get the project started in July 2022
Sonic Territories: Wambuul is a multi-staged project of audio stories, community events and artworks, centred on the Wambuul/ Macquarie River, taking in Wellington, Dubbo and Narromine. It invites collaboration and participation by other regionally-based artists and the community — as documenters, observers, contributors and storytellers. Each participant takes a thread of the resulting conversation back into their community, further developing the narrative and increasing awareness of the issues impacting the river’s future. READ MORE
Sonic Territories: Galari, 2020 – 2022
Sampling sounds (and video) from the headwaters of the Galari/Lachlan River to the Great Cumbung Swamp, Sonic Territories: Galari, Kim V. Goldsmith has been examining the development of the river from pre-colonial to contemporary times, giving the river a voice in the process.
Acknowledging the ‘politics’ of developing and managing the river today, the project focuses on the connections communities the length of the Galari have to the river (through storytelling), central to finding common ground and envisioning a shared future, that accepts the complexities.
Recording sites have, to date, included Wyangala Dam to Darbys Falls, Oxley and the Great Cumbung Swamp. The project is ongoing (pending funding).
A video capturing sounds and images of the river from Wyangala to the Great Cumbung Swamp was produced in mid-2022, titled Tenuous threads. It’s was a finalist in the 60th Fisher’s Ghost Art Award at Campbelltown Arts Centre.
WATCH THE VIDEO BY CLICKING ON THE IMAGE BELOW
Stories of the Galari
READ MORE ABOUT UNCLE RAY WOODS IN THE SYDNEY BIENNALE, 2022
This project was made possible thanks to a 2020 residency at the CORRIDOR project.
As I travel the length of the Galari/Lachlan River, from the headwaters near Breadalbane to the Great Cumbung Swamp near Oxley, I pay my respects to the Elders of the Wiradyuri Nation and neighbouring Nations – past and present, for whom the Galari was and is so culturally significant. – Kim V. Goldsmith