Hannah Weinberger at Basel Kunsthalle

The young Swiss artist presents the site-specific sound installation When You Leave, Walk Out Backwards, So I'll Think You're Walking In.

In Hannah Weinberger's new installation at the Basel Kunsthalle, music and sound fill the five ground floor galleries. Loundspeakers dot the space, in a striking visual arrangement, while curtains installed alongside the walls assure the absorption of echoes. This is Weinberger's first solo exhibition, completely shaped by music and sound in relationship with the galleries' structure. The artist has produced twenty-two hours of sound for the installation. Eleven loops are played on the eleven channels the artist installed in the galleries, resulting in a spatial sound layout that shifts continuously through the exhibition spaces.

The loops are always composed in one timbre, in which major and minor keys harmonize together. The basic form of each harmony develops into a body of sound and introduces the next harmony. A sense of calmness underlines the overall composition, in which diverse samples of presets — including drum kits, percussion, basses, grand pianos, synths and strings — revolve around the idea of a universal composition.

When You Leave, Walk Out Backwards, So I'll Think You're Walking In does not incorporate any live music or vocals. The artist, instead, appropriates those elements supplied by audio programs whose recombination is left to the user. The installation is experienced as a permanent remix.

Hannah Weinberger, <i>When You Leave, Walk Out Backwards, So I’ll Think You’re Walking In</i>, Basel Kunsthalle, 2012. Installation view — Hannah Weinberger, *When You Leave, Walk Out Backwards, So I’ll Think You’re Walking In*, Basel Kunsthalle, 2012. Installation view

Weinberger is a representative of the generation that has unlimited access to information and media, and her work revolves around music and sound performanc. The availability of affordable technology puts the production — and, consequently, instantaneous distribution — of high-quality music within everyone's reach. This way, the hierarchy of artistic production and distribution is transformed, as a single person can access all channels necessary to present a work to a mass audience. The discovery and selection of artistic works are therefore no longer only in the hands of a small number of individuals or of talent scouts. Music becomes a data stream of sounds.

Hannah Weinberger (1988, Filderstadt) lives and works in Basel and Zurich. She studied Media Arts from 2007 to 2010 at the Zurich University of the Arts where she received her BFA in 2010. She is currently finishing her MFA at the Zurich University of the Arts. In 2010 Weinberger received the travel award from the Kunsthalle Basel, awarded in the course of Regionale '11. She is one of the founding members of the project space in the courtyard of Museum für Gegenwartskunst Basel.

When You Leave, Walk Out Backwards,
So I'll Think You're Walking In
From 29 January to 18 March 2012
Kunsthalle Basel
Steinenberg, 7, Basel

Hannah Weinberger at Basel Kunsthalle

The young Swiss artist presents the site-specific sound installation When You Leave, Walk Out Backwards, So I'll Think You're Walking In.

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