Jennifer Allora and Guillermo Calzadilla: Never Mind That Noise You Heard :: February 8 - May 4, 2008 :: Stedelijk Museum CS, Oosterdokskade 5, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

The exhibition Never Mind That Noise You Heard provides an opportunity to see (and hear!) recent videos and installations by the collaborative artist team of Jennifer Allora (b.1974, USA) and Guillermo Calzadilla (b.1971, Cuba). In the exhibition, the Stedelijk Museum CS is presenting two large installations: Wake Up and Sediments, Sentiments (Figures of Speech), alongside four video works. The production and usage of sound is central to all of these works, which were created between 2004 and 2007.

The selection of works presented all have in common a shared interest in noise and its structuring through music. The continuum between these two sonic ends becomes a potentially rich tool through which cultural, social, and political relationships can be both gauged as well as challenged. Many works in the exhibition are the outcome of the investigations of the artists into how power, militarism, and war are encoded in to sound. Each work explores innovative ways to generate sound. The resulting sonic experiments provide new frames of meaning to otherwise familiar forms of musical expression.

In all the works presented, the artists theorize less about music, but rather through it. The design and setting of the exhibition were created in close collaboration with the artists so that taken as a whole the entire display creates a unique musical composition.

Allora and Calzadilla live in Puerto Rico and have worked together since 1995. In this time, they have developed a multifaceted oeuvre, consisting of installations, videos, performances, social interactions, work in public space, photos, and collages. Their work is characterized by a sense of playfulness, humour, and social involvement, focusing upon local situations, concrete materials and forms, all the while providing a platform to hear resonances within a larger global context.” - ‘The twisted soundtracks of war’,
Amsterdam Weekly

Curated by Martijn van Nieuwenhuyzen.

At certain times during the exhibition, singers from the Operastudio Nederland will present live performances.