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\hen Suzan Philipsz won the 2010 1urner Prize, it was the irst time in the award`s history
that it went to a sound artist. 1he mere act o Philipz`s ictory oten oershadowed critical
assessment o ortava., her winning piece. It was as i her ictory were not simply her own,
but a ictory or sound art altogether. Britain`s Channel 4 Culture Lditor, Matthew Cain,
wrote, 1he high-proile win or Susan Philipsz might just build this up to the tipping point
needed or sound art to really take o.`
1
Len those critical o Philipsz`s work, noted the
shit o attention rom her work to her ield. I we wanted to be slightly acetious,` wrote
critic Michael Gloer, we could call it history in the making. Sound artists are on the march!
Neer beore in the 26-year history o the 1urner Prize has it been won by an artist who had
nothing to show or her _25,000 prize money but sounds abricated by her own oice.` 1he
title o Gloer`s article acknowledges yet aoids the identiication o Philipsz`s ictory with
a indication or sound art altogether: 1hree cheers or sound artists. But not this one.` 1o
ensure that his critique o Philipsz would not be taken as trampling on the ragile ield, Gloer
nonchalantly wrote, Sound art is nothing new, o course,` oering a potted history:
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1heo an Doesburg was a pioneer. Kurt Schwitters made marelous sound art in
the 1920s and 1930s, his oice sculpts and swoops through the air like a biplane
out o control. At one moment it sounds like a bird, and then, moments later, like
the rising notes o a reing car. Ldith Sitwell was at it too with her luty oice. As
was Allen Ginsberg and Bob Cobbing.
2
\hether sound art is an emerging discipline or old hat, there is no doubt that the tbeor, of
.ovva art is currently a cottage industry. \ou can test the eracity the claim by perusing at
the spate o books that hae been published on the topic. 1o get a representatie sampling,
I recommend a quick glance at the catalog o books on sound published by Continuum.
Starting with Christoph Cox and Daniel \arner`s anthology .vaio Cvttvre rom 2004, there`s
been a new book on sound and sound art on Continuum just about eery 18 months: Brandon
LaBelle`s ac/grovva ^oi.e: er.ectire. ov .ovva art in 2006, Paul legarty`s ^oi.e,Mv.ic: a bi.tor,
rom 200, Seth Kim-Cohen`s v tbe tiv/ of av ar: torara. a vovcocbtear .ovic art rom 2009,
and Salom Voegelin`s i.tevivg to ^oi.e ava itevce: torara. a bito.ob, of .ovva art rom 2010.
,\e`re due or a new one any day now., Add to that list Doug Kahn`s now classic ^oi.e !ater
Meat, Alan Licht`s ovva .rt, Caleb Kelly`s edited olume ovva rom the \hitechapel Galley
series and you are on your way to a healthy bibliography.
Perhaps this recent work on a theory o sound art may come as a surprise. laen`t we had an
art o sounds or a ery long time, and hasn`t it gone by the name o music Not necessarily,
at least, according to two o these texts ,Seth Kim Cohen`s v tbe tiv/ of av ar and Salom
Voegelin`s i.tevivg to ^oi.e ava itevce,. Both authors explicitly theorize sound art as a practice
that is distinct rom music-distinct not by its use o sound, but by the perceptual, conceptual
and institutional issues raised by soundworks. Both authors attempt to dierentiate sound art
rom music in quite distinct, and quite incompatible, ways.
I will begin by quickly summarizing the arguments o both texts, with a special ocus on the
distinction between sound art and music. Next, I will demonstrate that Kim-Cohen`s and
Voegelin`s arguments are best understood when situated within current art historical and art-
critical narraties. I will argue that music plays the role o a alse opponent, that music is
occupying a place normally gien oer to an art-critical opponent. In so ar as music-more
speciically, certain ways o characterizing the aesthetics o music-unctions as a proxy or
art historical and art-critical positions, I will argue that both theories are unable to deelop
appropriate and salient terms or considering the relationship o sound art to music.
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In 1be tiv/ of av ar, Kim-Cohen adocates or a non-cochlear` sound art. 1he term non-
cochlear` is, o course, a transposition o the Duchampian notion o a non-retinal` isual
art into the auditory domain.
3
Kim-Cohen inlects the term in a conceptualist direction. le
qualiies non-cochlear` sound art by inoking Peter Osborne`s description o conceptual art,
an artorm based on the act o questioning existing deinitions.` Non-cochlear sound art
questions the institutions o the artworld, the relations o artist to spectator and the act o
art-making itsel, emphasizing process oer product, the meaning oer the physical artiact.
It draws attention neither to the materiality nor the perceptual eatures o some sounding
work, but towards eerything that has normally been proscribed by undue attention to the
sound itsel. Kim-Cohen, ollowing Derrida, uses the term arergov to designate the eatures
that typically outside the work` ,tbe ergov,.
4
1he power o Kim-Cohen`s book relies on the act that, in addition to oering original
readings o speciic works o sound art in non-cochlear` or conceptualist terms, he oers
a history o sound art that touches not only the practice o artists like Robert Morris or
Bruce Naumann-whose work is primarily isual but also includes a substantial amount o
work with sound-but also musicians like Pierre Schaeer, John Cage, Muddy \aters and
Bob Dylan. Kim-Cohen argues that, just as one can trace the roots o non-retinal` art to
Duchamp and the readymade, one can ind the roots o non-cochlear` art in Schaeer, Cage
and \aters. ,More on that in a moment.,
1he Duchampian and Derridean planks o Kim-Cohen`s project doetail when describing the
dierence between music and sound art. By the Derridean plank, I mean a commitment to the
arergov, by the Duchampian plank, I mean a commitment to Duchamp`s work understood as
an alternatie orm o modernism radically opposed to the ormalist commitments o abstract
art, say, as Clement Greenberg deined it. Music, writ large, is unsupported by either o these
planks.
Music has always unctioned according to Greenbergian precepts. As a practice,
music is positiely obsessed with its media speciicity. Only music includes, as a
part o its discursie ocabulary, a term or the oreign matter threatening always
to inect it: the extramusical.` ,Kim-Cohen, 39,
Perhaps is it beside the point to say that there are probably ery ew musicologists that would
agree with this characterization o music writ large.
5
But, i I can put that aside momentarily,
I would rather ocus on the logic o Kim-Cohen`s argument, in particular, how the categories
music` and sound art` are deined. So, being generous, let`s grant that Music ,writ large, is
concerned only with its own tonally moing orms` ,to borrow lanslick`s handy phrase, one
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that Kim-Cohen could hae used,, and that anything that exceeds these orms is considered
peripheral to the work itsel. It is precisely this excess that becomes central in sound art-or
what Kim-Cohen also designates as expanded sonic practice.` le writes,
An expanded sonic practice would include the spectator, who always carries, as
constituent parts o his or her subjectiity, a perspectie shaped by social, political,
gender, class and racial experience. It would necessarily include consideration o
the relationships to and between process and product, the space o production
ersus the space o reception, the time o making relatie to the time o beholding.
1hen there are history and tradition, the conentions o the site o encounter,
the context o perormance and audition, the mode o presentation, ampliication,
recording, reproduction. Nothing is out o bounds. 1o paraphrase Derrida, there
is no extra-music. ,10,
Riing on Derrida`s claim that there is nothing outside the text ,or literally there is no
outside-text`,, Kim-Cohen argues against the legitimacy o the category o the extra-musical.
And it is the nature o an expanded sonic practice` to expose the illegitimacy o such
a position by occupying the orbidden extra-musical,` by inerting the musical work, by
vvror/ivg it, by turning the arergov into the ergov. Deeloping the argument into a deinition,
|Sound art| is merely the remainder created by music closing o its borders to the
extra-musical, to any instance o arote that could not be comortably expressed
in the tavgve o the \estern notational system. Instances o non-\estern music
would not be sound art. Although they may employ speciic eatures, such as
microtonalities not represented in the western octae |sic|, these eatures can still
be understood and, to some extent, represented in a way that is legible to \estern
musical methods. Sound art is art that posits meaning or alue in registers not
accounted or by \estern musical systems. Unlike sculpture, and to a lesser extent,
cinema, music ailed to recognize itsel in its expanded situation. ,10,
1he most proocatie claim is that non-\estern music` wouldn`t be sound art. lor Kim-
Cohen, the ontology o sound art is necessarily in opposition to \estern Music since it
occupies the extramusical,` the supplement proscribed by Music. Sound art is constructed
out o the ai.;ecta vevbra o \estern music. Sound art is Music`s Otber.
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But not all \estern music has ailed to acknowledge its expanded situation. In act, Kim-
Cohen`s book opens with three musical instances rom the year 1948, which unction as
signiicant moments or the birth o an expanded sonic practice rom the conditions o music.
1he three instances are 1, Pierre Schaeer and the inention o vv.iqve covcrete, 2, John Cage
and his itevt Pra,er, a silent piece that predates the more amous 1`, and 3, Muddy \aters`
electriied recording o I leel Like Going lome.` Kim-Cohen selects these three because
Schaeer, Cage, and \aters each represent a dierent alternatie to serialism, or, more
generally, to the systematization and quantiication o the alues o music.` ,260, Schaeer
constructs a music that sheds the discreetness o the note, by the use o recorded sound,
Cage explores orms o compositional non-intentionality and embraces all sounds, een those
preiously heard as unmusical, \aters creates a music that, by eschewing interest in orm,
becomes a kind o cultural lypaper, trapping the concerns o its time and place.` ,261,
But Schaeer and Cage ultimately ail to become non-cochlear, both, ater leaing behind
the ormal system` ,261, o music, close themseles o to the extramusical by committing
themseles to sounds-in-themseles`, by expanding the palette o sounds that music can use,
but without expanding the situation o music. lor example,
1he potentially conceptual inspiration |or 4`33`| turns out to be a materialist,
listening actiity, still ery much about the ear-an engagement with sound-in-
itsel, and thus subject to the same shortcomings we would ascribe to retinal
art.4`33` neer strays rom the condition o music most admired by the
Romantic poets: musical areerentiality. ,163,
Sounds-in-themseles are the real enemy in Kim-Cohen`s book. Insoar as Kim-Cohen
understands the history o music to be a history o the sound-in-itsel, music is cochlear.
Insoar as contemporary sound art becomes interested in sound-in-themseles, it too is
cochlear. ,lor instance, this is a charge made against Christina Kubisch and LaMonte \oung,.
Kim-Cohen`s maxim is the ollowing: As ar as the experience o art is concerned, the
reelation o phenomena is not enough.` ,112, Kim-Cohen is committed to a orm o .ovic
iaeati.v, in the sense that works o sound art are not to be made intelligible on the basis o their
perceptual properties, rather, perceptual properties are to be made intelligible on the basis o
their conceptual, social, or institutional aspects. Kim-Cohen`s sonic idealism is ounded on
the tradition o the readymade, because:
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1he intention o the readymade is embodied in the act o nominating the object
as art, not in the object itsel. 1he aesthetic alue is deried, not rom the isual
or material qualities o the nominated object as it relates to the tradition o art
objects, but rom the artistic act as it relates to the tradition o artistic acts. ,113,
1hus, a piece o vv.iqve covcrete like Luc lerrari`s Pre.qve Riev, which has oten been
understood as a sonic readymade, passes the test-while Schaeer`s compositions ail.
|In Pre.qve Riev| sound is not stripped o its meaning, neutralized as sound-in-
itsel, to be reconstructed as a composition. Instead, its connection to a social
reality is let intact. More than that, the social meaning o the sounds play a part in
determining their placement and treatment in the composition. 1o do this, lerrari
music approach his sounds not just as a listener.he must approach sound as a
reader. ,19,
1he igure o reaaivg is central to the deense o non-cochlear sound art. Reading,` or Kim-
Cohen, means playing with codes, negotiating with signs, or operating with relations. Reading
is always social, intersubjectie, and dierential. A non-cochlear` sound art is an art o ,and
about, reading sounds.
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In contrast, Salom Voegelin`s book, i.tevivg to ^oi.e ava itevce, could be characterized
as a phenomenological aesthetics o listening. Voegelin describe listening as a perceptual
engagement with the world, not an act o deciphering codes. 1he listener is always in a
position o uncertainty, always in the midst o constituting the object heard as well as
constituting themseles. Voegelin starts with these ideas on the irst page o Chapter 1:
Lery sensory interaction relates back to us not the object,phenomenon
perceied, but that object,phenomenon iltered, shaped and produced by the
sense employed in its perception. At the same time this sense outlines and ills
the perceiing body, which in its perception shapes and produces his sensory sel.
\hereby the senses employed are always already ideologically and aesthetically
determined, bringing their own inluence to perception, the perceptual object and
the subject. It is a matter then o accepting the ariori inluence while working
towards a listening in spite rather than because o it. 1he task is to suspend, as
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much as possible, ideas o genre, category, purpose and art historical context, to
achiee a hearing that is the material heard, now, contingently and indiidually. ,3,
A ew claims stand out: irst, she claims that the object,phenomenon ,which is already a
problematic conjunction in phenomenological terms, is beivg roavcea` by the sense modality
employed. ,\e might want to call this the listener as producer` moti., Second, sensation
ills the perceiing body,` which I take to mean that sensation helps to make the perceier`s
body perspicuous. ,More on that later., 1hird, it is desirable or a listener to suspend aspects
o sounds that concern genre, category, art historical context and purpose. 1he desideratum
is a mode o listening that is utterly present, ixed on the perception o the material heard`
,which is not to be mistaken with materiality wholesale but rather with the materiality o
perception,. 1he use o the word suspend` is no accident on Voegelin`s part, it is meant to
inoke ,in a loose way, the amous lusserlian eocbe.
\hen I suspend genre, category, history and such, I also suspend ision. Vision oerrides
hearing, since, according to Voegelin, we are ingrained into subsum|ing| sound into the
isual.` Vision, by its ery nature assumes a distance rom the object.Seeing always
happens in a meta-position, away rom the seen. And this distance enables a detachment
and objectiity that presents itsel as truth.` ,xi-xii, Listening does not possess the objectiity
and security o ision. By contrast, hearing is ull o doubt: phenomenological doubt o the
listener about the heard and himsel hearing it. learing does not oer a meta-position, there
is no place where I am not simultaneous with the heard. loweer ar the source, the sound
sits in my ear. I cannot hear it i I am not immersed in its auditory object, which is not its
source but sound as sound itsel.` ,xii,
,I should note that Voegelin doesn`t actually argue or this essentialist epistemology o seeing
and hearing, she simply repeats what has become a historically common trope in the literature
on sound, media, and in cultural history o the senses.
6
Since it is asserted, to gie a air
summary o Voegelin`s text we must take it on aith. Perhaps I can illustrate Voegelin`s claim
by an example. 1ake the sound o an airplane in the sky. Since the sound takes time to trael
to us, when we look up it does not appear where we think it might. Perhaps this contradicts
Voegelin`s claim that we are always simultaneous with the heard. loweer, it depends on
what the heard` is. lor Voegelin, the heard is simply the sound itsel, not the thing to which
the sound reers. 1hat is why she dierentiates the source` rom the sound itsel.` I am
always simultaneous with the sound itsel, since I don`t experience the sound itsel unless
I`m in the act o hearing it. Voegelin`s ontology o sound capitalizes on the obseration that
sounds can be emitted rom objects in ways that their look, or isual attributes, cannot. \hen
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I worry about the act that the plane doesn`t appear in the sky where I hear it to be, Voegelin
might think this a case o subsuming sound to the isual.,
1he act o suspending genre, category, history and what-hae-you, is also an act o suspending
ision. Cast in explicitly lusserlian terms, a sonic epoch.is a stripping away rom the sonic
anything that ties it to isuality.|1he aim is| not to reduce the heard but to get to the wealth
o the heard through bracketed listening.` ,35, By itsel, this claim is not all that interesting.
It is basically a proession o aith in a airly unsophisticated orm o sonic phenomenology.

But Voegelin does something surprising with it. She uses the substantie claims that emerge
rom the eocbe against Music, writ large. Music, or Voegelin, means notated music. Insoar as
notated music is isual, or depends on the source o the sound, the perormer, or the notated
score more than the sounds themseles, music becomes isual.
1he impulse to subsume sound into the isual is so ingrained as to blight music
criticism and the discourse o sound art, whose ocus is inariably on the score
or the arrangement, on the orchestra or the perormer, the sound source, the
installation iew or the documentation o the sonic eent, in short the isual
maniestation rather than the sounds heard. ,xi,
And a ew pages later, 1he text as writing is the musical work, ramed by conention,
it allows entry to scrutinizing eyes that interpret it, while granting it the space or that
interpretation.` ,8, Music, with its emphasis on the score and the perormer, is a legible
medium, it becomes an act o reading and interpreting, it is conceptual, not perceptual, its
essence is isual. And, although Voegelin insists that, the issue here is not a distinction
between music and sound art, but how both o them are listened to.,` ,8, I am coninced
that that is the case. lere is her strongest case or music as primarily isual-as requiring a
dierent mode o listening than the mode proper to sound art:
\hen training as a classical musician you are asked to identiy minor thirds, perect
iths, major seenths and so on: sounds are gien names and are organized in
relation to each other, and it becomes a matter o recognizing what is being played
and attributing the right term to the corresponding tonal relationship. \ou cannot
possibly gie the right answer unless you know what you are listening or, and
the listening or` is neer the sound but its isual point o reerence.lrom this
moment on you are listening to the language o music.Sonic experience, which
inds no acknowledgement in such a musical orientation.seizes |sic| to be heard.
,52-3,
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I music requires a mode o listening that seeks out the known, the oreseen, the already
determined, sound art requires a mode o listening that seeks out the unknown, the
unoreseen. Listening to sound art entails an ongoing act o /vorivg, taken as a present
participle, as constituting its knowledge a. it comes into being.
An aesthetic and philosophy o sound art is based on.a drie to knowing.1his
knowing is the experience o sound as temporal relationship. 1his relationship` is
not between things but is the thing, the sound itsel. ,4-5,
1he chain o associations is telling. Sound is based on knowing, knowing is a relationship, the
relationship is with the sound itsel. 1he sound itsel is the source o intrinsic alue-the
wealth,` as she puts it. Although Voegelin neer says it directly, I suppose that insoar as
one can listen to music in a suspended` way, listening to it as sound themseles, then music
becomes sound art. 1he dierence between these two modes o listening, between music
and sound art, is deined in terms o the dierence between the isual and the auditory. 1he
auditory is proper to sound art, and sound art`s proper object is the sound itsel.
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At this point, allow me to make a ew synoptic comparisons.
lirst, Kim-Cohen and Voegelin utterly disagree about the alue o sounds-in-themseles.`
lor Voegelin, sound art requires a mode o listening whose aim is directed to sounds-
themseles and not to language, context, history, genre, category and such, or Kim-Cohen,
sound art is a practice that inhabits the extramusical,` that inestigates relationships,
institutions, context, sociality, and history, it eschews sounds-in-themseles as a rejection the
metaphysics o presence.
Second, or Voegelin sound art is undamentally perceptual, whereas or Kim-Cohen it is
conceptual. \here Voegelin uses the phenomenological reduction as a method or ocusing
attention on the sound itsel, Kim-Cohen critiques the phenomenological reduction as
bracketing out all inormation that might shade our auditory experience with signiication,
with historical contingency, with social import.` ,13, Insoar as both Voegelin and Kim-
Cohen understand phenomenology as a perceptual endeaor-a problematic characterization
o the phenomenological project rom point o iew o the history o philosophy-their
theories dier about the alue o this endeaor. I we take phenomenology to be primarily
to be about the primacy o perception,` then Kim-Cohen`s disapprobation and Voegelin`s
approbation both ollow.
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1hird, or Voegelin sound art is an act o listening, which must circument our habitual
subordination o sound to the isual. Music`s historical inestment in isual things like scores
and perormers preents genuine listening, transorming it into an act o reading. lor Kim-
Cohen, sound art i. an act o reading, o making legible a set o social, institutional, and
historical traces. Sonic materiality or perceptual eidence is neer the proper content o sound
art. 1he reelation o phenomena is not enough.` It is neer about the sound o the sign,
but only its signiicance.
1hese three comparisons are really just ways o naming the dierence between Kim-Cohen`s
.ovic iaeati.v and Voegelin`s .ovic bevovevotog,. In the ormer, the perceptual properties o
works are to be made intelligible on the basis o their conceptual, social or institutional
aspects, in the latter, the conceptual, social or institutional aspects o sounds are to be made
intelligible on the basis o their perceptual properties.
But there is one more comparison to make-perhaps the most telling. Both theories are
Mv.icobobic. Both Kim-Cohen and Voegelin deelop theories o sound art that necessarily
require Music ,writ large,, but only as a negatie, as an altogether-Other. Both deine their
theories as resisting the hegemony o Music and understand sound art as inhabiting an
alternatie that Music cannot occupy. Despite the other dierence, there is a .trvctvrat agreevevt
between Voegelin and Kim-Cohen. Both require Music as an Other, yet, they utterly disagree
about how to characterize Music`s Otherness. lor Kim-Cohen, Music is ixated on sounds-in-
themseles to secure autonomy and proscribe eerything extramusical, or Voegelin, Music is
ixated on eerything that is not the sound-themseles, that is the score, the perormer, genre,
category, history, and so orth, and thus staes o the possibility o a more proper, attentie
and ocused mode o listening.
!2" 7)8,. 96: -,. :*+ ;+&-,./ )< 96: =*+)65
Is this simply a disagreement \e might be inclined to attribute the whole dispute to two
ery dierent aesthetic commitments, to two dierent senses o what is at stake in sound art,
and choose the one we preer. I would resist this inclination, because, I think there is more
to the situation than that. 1here is a disciplinary component-an art historical and artworld
or institutional component-that is driing this disagreement and shaping, in particular, their
claims about music.
As beore, I will start with Kim-Cohen. lis account is based, quite explicitly, on the work
o Rosalind Krauss. Kim-Cohen`s theory o an expanded sonic practice` transposes Krauss`
argument rom her amous essay Sculpture in the Lxpanded lield` into the register o sound
art.
8
In that essay ,and elsewhere,, Krauss argues that the expanded situation o sculpture
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,meaning minimalist works, earthworks, installations and such, challenges the Modernist
account o the artwork-perhaps epitomized in Clement Greenberg`s amous essay,
Modernist Painting.`
9
Krauss characterizes the Modernist as committed to the iew that the artwork is a natural
,non-arbitrary, sign. ,Krauss 1990, 195, 1he Modernist art historian, or example, might
tell a story about how Impressionist painting becomes Abstraction by appealing to artists`
deepening inestment in the physical interactions o color. According to Krauss, 1he result
o this was, within the deelopment o modernist painting, the reiication o the retinal
surace and the coniction that by knowing the laws o its interactie relationships, one then
possessed the algorithm o sight. 1he mapping o the retinal ield onto the modernist pictorial
plane with the positiist expectation that the laws o the one would legislate and underwrite
the laws o the other, is typical o the orm in which high modernism established and then
etishized an autonomous realm o the isual.` ,186, Krauss, ollowing Duchamp, calls this
retinal painting.` 1o clariy, take Impressionism. In terms o retinal painting,` one might
argue that the Impressionist painter, by reproducing on the canas the indiidual bits o color
originally impressed on the retina, would hae a non-arbitrary rule or making depictions.
1he isual system, by oering purely perceptual data, proides a natural, positiistic basis or
representation.
But this belie in the artwork as a natural sign comes deinitely to an end with the rise o,
what Krauss and her co-editors o .rt ivce 100 call, Antimodernism` and Postmodernism.
According to Krauss, to get inside the systems o this work |Antimodern or Postmodern|,
whether Le\itt`s or Judd`s or Morris`s, is precisely to enter a world without a center, a world
o substitutions and transpositions nowhere legitimated by the reelations o a transcendental
subject.` ,Krauss 1985, 258, Substitutability challenges the security o the natural sign, i one
thing is as good as another, i one thing is exchangeable or another, there is no longer a
suicient reason to guarantee the uniqueness o the natural sign or its motiation. 1he natural
sign is unmasked as a brute act, as arbitrary.
1he consequences o this work` are deastating or the belie in the primacy o medium and
material. According to Krauss, 1he space o postmodernist practice is no longer organized
around the deinition o a gien medium on the grounds o material, or, or that matter, the
perception o material.` ,289, Notice, neither vateriat nor tbe ercetiov of vateriat ,the retinal
registration o the subject matter or material, can act as the basis or an expanded practice.
And, i the material is no longer operatie, on what basis can postmodern practice act
According to Krauss, postmodern practice operates on a set o cultural terms, or which any
medium-photography, books, lines on walls, mirrors, or sculpture itsel-might be used.`
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,288, Lach medium is as good as any other-each is substitutable, arbitrary-since what we
are now articulating is not essentially material. It is, as Krauss says, a set o cultural terms.
Kim-Cohen transposes Krauss` argument to the register o sound art, presering een its
phrasing and cadence: A non-cochlear sonic art present|s| itsel in -,5 &+.%8&>
4*):)36-4*5? @))A/? 1%,+/ ), B-11/? &%66)6/? /0814:86+, as well as perormance, speech,
choreography, social practice, and so on.` ,156, Analogous to Krauss` critique o retinal
painting, we get a critique o cochlear sound, i.e., Music, which tries to ground itsel materially,
and non-arbitrarily, on the sounds themseles. 1he transposition is as explicit as possible: It
does not seem too much o a stretch to ind some common ground between Greenberg and
Schaeer. Just as Greenberg reduced painting to its essential element, jettisoning anything
that wasn`t undamental to its constitution, excising anything that was shared with another
mediums |sic|, so too did Schaeer reduce music.` ,15, Non-cochlear sound, like non-retinal
art, is indierent to media since it eschews a medium-speciic grounding in aor o a set
o cultural terms.` Artworks become tools or inestigating the cultural lieworld,` ,15, an
attempt to make the grammar o institutional, social and conentionally codes explicit.
10
But there is something missing in Kim-Cohen`s transposition. In particular, he does not
remain aithul to the ull connotation o the non-retinal` in Krauss` usage. Kim-Cohen
understands non-retinal` to be roughly synonymous with conceptual,` to reer to the
institutional, conentional and social arerga proscribed by the ,Greenbergian, Modernist
work. 1he one thing non-cochlear sound art i. vot is perceptual. \et, when Krauss writes
about Duchamp`s non-retinal art, perception is reci.et, her ocus. In her essay, In the Blink
o an Lye,` the term non-retinal is employed to describe how, in Duchamp`s work, the iewer
accesses the sensations o ision that are generated entirely by the body o the iewer.`
,Krauss 1990, 18, 1hese sensations are not retinal sensations, i one thinks o the retina
as a site o passie registration o light, akin to a tabvta ra.a, or irgin photographic plate.
1he bodily sensations Krauss has in mind are those the boa, it.etf brings to the act o seeing,
or, better yet, those bodily conditions that permit the act o seeing: the curature o one`s
eyeballs, the production o aterimages, and the rhythmic muscular motion o the eyes in
binocular ision. 1hese are the physiological conditions o seeing that cannot be accounted
or by the notion o the eye as a tabvta ra.a, or spatial point.
Duchamp`s work, according to Krauss, oers us an interpretie paradox` because, in the
light o Duchamp`s ehement rejection o the retinal,` we hae nonetheless to acknowledge
the presence o physiological optics at work within Duchamp`s thinking and production.`
,184, 1he phrase physiological optics` is noteworthy because Krauss` contrasts it with a
geometrical model` o ision, the Classical isual order o single-point perspectie with its
disembodied, mathematized iewer. ,1he phrase physiological optics` is also a bit conusing
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because Krauss eentually uses the word optics` as a shorthand or the geometrical model,
in contrast to the physiology o ision` which designates the newly discoered, bodily regime
o ision., lor Krauss, the classical geometrical model irst comes under attack with the birth
o the physiology o ision, exempliied in the experimental work o Goethe, Johannes Mller
and lelmholtz. listorically, Goethe initiates the study o a physiology-and no longer
and optics-o ision, a physiology that understands the body o the iewer as the actie
producer o optical experience.` ,190, Or, reerring to Mller`s experiments with electricity
and sensation, Color, which can simply be produced by electrical stimulation o the optic
nere, is henceorth seered rom a speciically spatial reerent.` ,190, 1he Classical order o
the natural sign is challenged when the physiology o ision exposes optics as the production
o the iewer, not the registration o qualities o exterior bodies. Under this new, physiological
regime o ision, the natural sign`s necessary connection to the isual ield can no longer be
maintained.` ,190, \hen the artwork can no longer be understood in terms o the natural
sign, the consequence is vot ovt, that it opens up the possibility o endless substitutions
o signiication, but that it .ecificatt, allows or the iewer to become aware o their own
productiity a. a rierer.
Krauss interprets Duchamp`s work as staging the battle between geometrical optics and
physiological ision. \hat results is the recognition o the iewer`s own bodily contribution to
seeing. 1o take only one instance rom her many readings o Duchamp, I the mechanism o
the arge Cta.. obeys Duchamp`s dictum o going beyond` the retina, it does so not to achiee
the condition o ision`s transparency to itsel-which is suggested by the model o classical
perspectie when applied to the Cta..-but rather, quite obiously.to construct ision
itsel within the opacity o the organs.` ,18, Krauss oers the same reading or artists
whose works, inluenced by Duchamp, relect an alternatie to Greenbergian modernism.
Describing Richard Serra`s bift, she writes: 1he iewer o Serra`s work, unlike the spectator
o constructiist sculpture, is neer represented ,in the sculpture, as stationary. 1he iewer
is always described as in motion een i that motion is only the constant &%06)&8/081-6
-.C8/:&+,:/ that are the 0)64)6+-1%D+. 0),.%:%), )< @%<)0-1 E%/%),.` ,Krauss 1985, 20,
She repeats the point in her reading o Robert Morris and Donald Judd: In the minimalist
work o Donald Judd or Robert Morris.-@/:6-0: 3+)&+:6%+/ -6+ 0),/:-,:15 /8@&%::+. :)
:*+ .+<%,%:%), )< - /%:+. E%/%),.` ,26, In other words, don`t conuse all those cubes and
regular polyhedrons with geometric optics. By sited ision,` Krauss means an embodied or
physiological ision, one that produces its isual experience.
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And here`s the irony. I we accept Krauss` reading o non-retinal` art as a deense o
artworks where the iewer is not simply the receier but a producer-as a deense o artworks
where productiity o the iewer is made perspicuous-then, analogously, a vovcocbtear
.ovva art begiv. to too/ vvcb vore ti/e a aefev.e of 1oegetiv`. ro;ect tbav KivCobev`..
1his is because, unlike Kim-Cohen, Voegelin is explicitly interested in moments where, as
she puts it, the listener becomes producer.` ,38, In act, this is entailed by her ontology
o sound. Sound, or Voegelin, is always ephemeral, eanescent, and immaterial-or, to use
another o Krauss` aorite terms, forvte... 1he sonic thing is not perspectial, organized in
relation to other things, social unctions or ordered in relation to a purpose.neither ormed
nor deormed, but ormless unless it meets the hearing body.` ,19, Voegelin`s dematerialized
ontology o sound is always paired with the productiity o the listener. Objects must get
their objectiity rom somewhere, so, as sounds becomes less and less substantial-more
and more ormless-the productiity o perception becomes more and more constitutie.
lor example, Voegelin writes, In the experience o our own generatie perception we
produce the objectiity rom our subjectie and particular position o listening.` ,14, Or,
when listening in the mode proper to sound art, the phenomenological subject.perorms
a reduced listening which does not hear a place but produces its own.` ,163, 1he listener
become producer` is Voegelin`s maxim.
Since eerything gets reduced down to the productiity o the listener, some pretty
monotonous descriptions o soundworks ollow. lere is Voegelin on Bernard Parmegiani`s
Matiere. ivavite.: I sense it as a ormless shape that <%11/ &+ B%:* &5 <)6&.` ,16, Listening
produces the vatiere ivavite. as a subjectie object.` ,1, \hen describing Cathy Lane`s
Ov tbe Macbair, a piece which employs ield recordings rom the Scottish Outer lebrides,
Voegelin writes, |the place| that the recordings are rom is, in its composition, not a place
as a certain geographical location, a dwelling place, but a ictional place 46).80+. %, &5
%,,)E-:%E+ 1%/:+,%,3"` ,21, 1o be air, Voegelin registers occasional discomort with this
position, claiming that, this does not mean that there are no artistic intentions nor that there
really is equality between composer and listener, because, o course, there is not.` ,21-2, \et,
despite her scruples, the listener always trumps. On the ery next page she writes: Ov tbe
Macbair produces sense as a sonic knowing.I would be ery hard pressed to tell you an exact
knowledge gained, but I could discuss - /+,/+ )< A,)B%,3 -@)8: &5/+1< in relation to the
sonic material and :*+ :%&+ -,. 41-0+ 46).80+. %, &5 1%/:+,%,3"` ,23,
Although Voegelin`s ocus on the ti.tever a. roavcer is congruent with Krauss` project, it too
misses something important. One irtue o Krauss` account was that the conceptual and
perceptual eatures o artworks were both vece..ar,. 1his is not to endorse Krauss` position,
but simply to note something about her work that is relected in neither Kim-Cohen`s nor
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Voegelin`s theories. 1he productiity o the isual system could only come into isibility in
works that undertook a critique o the conceptual, conentional and ideological eatures o
artworks, the critique o the natural sign is necessary or the disclosure o physiological ision.
\hen those two eatures are separated, much weaker aesthetic positions emerge. In
Voegelin`s work, the airmation o the ti.tever a. roavcer unmoors listening rom the object
heard. Despite her emphasis on the perceptual eatures o soundworks, the actual perceptible
eatures o soundworks play little role. ler ocus is on exploring how those perceptions are
v, roavctiov.. \e hear ourseles hearing, and that seems to be enough. \et, i all we do is hear
is ourseles hearing, why does the ormless` stimulus een matter \hy go hear sound art
at all i, ultimately, any sound will do
Voegelin`s position, with its emphasis on the productie role o the beholder, is congruent
with other, recent work in new media aesthetics-work not necessarily dedicated to sounds
or sound art. Mark lansen, in ^er Pbito.ob, for ^er Meaia, describes the aesthetics o new
media in neo-Bergsonian terms, the beholder`s body operates as a ilter, selecting rom the
barrage o images` striking the sensorium. Normally, a medium might operate as the ground
or an image,` supplying it with a orm. But digital works are dierent, they are medium-
indierent since the data streams upon which they are built can be rendered as sounds,
images, or anything else. lor lansen, data hae no priileged medium or orm, thus, the onus
o the artwork, its ormation, is placed onto the beholder. Correlated with the adent o
digitization,` lansen writes, the body undergoes a certain empowerment, since it deploys its
own constitutie singularity ,aection and memory, not to ilter a unierse o preconstitued
images, but actually to evfrave something ,digital inormation, that is originally ormless.`
,lansen, 10, I you replace digital inormation` or sound,` the congruence with Voegelin
is obious.
Moreoer, it is telling. lor lansen, new media makes the beholder`s capacity to enrame
ormless data perspicuous, thus, new media art is post-medial art. According to lansen, lor
a theory o art in the speciically post-medium` condition named by the digital, the body itsel
is inested with the responsibility o presering within itsel the sel-diering condition o
media.` ,32, Voegelin wants to make the same claim about the hearing body: 1he sonic thing
is.neither ormed nor deormed, but ormless unless it meets the hearing body.` ,Voegelin,
19, 1he hearing body is responsible or orming the artwork, a task ormerly grounded in
the medium. But unlike lansen`s new media aesthetic, Voegelin`s aesthetic o sound art is
ultimately contradictory, sound unctions as the perect medium or post-medial aesthetics.
1he conusion in her position indicates that something has gone awry.
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In the case o Kim-Cohen`s non-cochlear` aesthetics, the perceptual eatures o some
speciic sound work do not really matter since the purpose o non-cochlear works is to
acknowledge the expanded social, institutional or contextual situation o the work. 1he
problem with this iew is that one cannot tell why the speciic sounds matter. In what ways
do tbe .ecific .ovva. act as a constraint on the releant social questions
1he strangest part is the alse dichotomy between .ovva. and .ociet,. It is as i attention to
a sound can only occur when one reduces out its social, semiotic, institutional or historical
aspects. It is as i .ovva. and .ociet, were two incompatible aspects o a whole, like the duck
and the rabbit in Jastrow`s amous igure. 1he choice is forcea, one can either hear sounds as
sounds-in-themseles` or as part o a social code. But one can neer bear iv sounds their
sociality.
11
In the conclusion to v tbe tiv/ of av ar, Kim-Cohen reasserts this orced choice by way o
a quotation. Luc lerrari, speaking o the Darmstadt Summer Courses, laconically laid out the
options that composers o the 1950s and 60s aced: \ou had to choose between serialism
and girls. I chose girls.` ,260, Kim-Cohen reads this sentences as symbolic o the two paths
aailable or a sonic art: inward, toward a conseratie retrenchment ocused on materials
and on concerns considered essential to music` or outward, toward that which lies beyond
the traditional borders o the ield,` toward the expanded situation, toward non-cochlear
sonic art, toward the social. ,261, lerrari chose to moe outward to girls, rom music to the
world. In the gallery arts, the moement has been decisiely outward, away rom the center.`
,261,
1his is a forcea choice, sound art can ollow the bad path o Music, or the good path o the
gallery arts. ,1he thumb has been placed on the scale, since Kim-Cohen neer oers Music
a red-blooded deense., As I said earlier, ew musicologists would agree to the premises. \et,
surprisingly, when addressing the music he really likes-rock and roll-neither does Kim-
Cohen.
12
In some o the best writing in the book, Kim-Cohen oers an impressie analysis o Bob
Dylan`s Like a Rolling Stone.` le argues that Like a Rolling Stone,` exposes all o Dylan`s
songs as products o the chaotic bricolage o signiying grids. It exposes Dylan himsel. It
exposes the desperation and desires o the culture.` ,209, As part o the argument, Kim-
Cohen ocuses on the sonic details: he describes Dylan`s phrasing on the word eel,` how
it is rhythmically displaced rom erse to erse, working against the musical patterns set out
by the backing band, he describes the details o instrumental parts and the way they change
oer time, he describes the disruptie presence o the tambourine, pushed into the oreground
o the mix, he describes the messy instrumental accompaniment, and how it registers the
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uncertainty o the musicians ollowing Dylan, he also describes a subtle tape splice at the
beginning o the ourth erse, and muses about how that it can oer eidence or Dylan`s
intent: I what I hear i. a tape splice, it would mean that Dylan and |producer 1om| \ilson
elt they`d tapped something aluable in the irst three erses-something that in spite o its
ery apparent laws-or perhaps because o them-was able to communicate the abstract
, complex business o the song and the moment.` ,202-3, In arguing about the presence
o tape splice, Kim-Cohen must appeal to the ear. Such moments can only be heard, not
read. Attention to those details requires a cochlea. Moreoer, Kim-Cohen attends to those
moments in order to plumb their social meaning. lis descriptions o Dylan`s music belie his
book`s own premises. 1hey demonstrate that we do not hae to choose between hearing the
sounds or hearing the social.
It only appears otherwise when orced to make a decision between sound and society. 1hat
orced choice rests on unsound premises. \hat Kim-Cohen oerlooks is that Music ,writ
large,, een at it most seere claim to autonomy, is always already social. Autonomy is a social
act, despite the composers, sound artists, musicologists or critics who reuse to recognize it.
1heodor Adorno made this crystal clear quite a long time ago: No music has the slightest
esthetic worth i it is not socially true, i only as a negation o untruth, no social content
o music is alid without an esthetic objectiication.` ,Adorno 196, 19, 1hat dialectical
position in seered in Kim-Cohen`s argument. It is traded in or an ideology critique o
sounds-in-themseles. But one can hold to the social character o music, een autonomous`
music, without alling prey to the ideology o sound-in-themseles.
13
1he way to argue against the ideology o the sound-in-itsel isn`t by turning Music ,writ large,
into a straw man and then doggedly committing onesel to its alleged other, the social. 1he
way to argue against the ideology o sound-in-itsel is to demonstrate that sound is always
already social-whether notated or improised, \estern or non-\estern, Music or Sound
Art. Moreoer, to say that sounds are social is not to say anything o interest, since that is
simply gien, eerything humans do is part o the cultural lieworld.` I one wants to pursue
the sociality or culturality in sounds, the point is to speciy the relation between orms o
sociality and the sounds made.
Adorno proides useul correctie to the Musicophobia o Voegelin and Kim-Cohen. le
argues, again and again, or the indissolubility o the sonic and social, the perceptual and the
conceptual. One example will hae to suice:
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Len Beethoen`s music, bourgeois music at its height, reerberates with the roar
and ideal o the heroic years o its class just as dreams in the early-morning
hours resound with the noise o its day, and the social content o great music is
grasped not by sensual listening but only the conceptually mediated knowledge o
its elements and their coniguration. ,Adorno 2006, 100,
Neither Kim-Cohen nor Voegelin are in a position to articulate the dialectical condition o
sound and society. No matter how much you oreground the perceptions and sensation o
the listener, no matter how much you oreground the social and conceptual aspects o the
situation, you cannot get past the elements and coniguration o the work. It is the only thing
that the listener`s ear and expanded situation hae in common.
\hat remains is a theoretical question: is sound art is ultimately a branch o music, or a branch
o post-medial aesthetics, or new media aesthetics, or relational aesthetics. It may turn out
that sound art is, as Max Neuhaus argued, a cowardly and imprecise category:
It`s as i perectly capable curators in the isual arts suddenly lose their equilibrium
at the mention o the word sound. 1hese same people who would all ridicule a new
art orm called, say, Steel Art` which was composed o steel sculpture combined
with steel guitar music along with anything else with steel in it, somehow hae no
trouble at all swallowing Sound Art`. In art, the medium is not oten the message.
,Neuhaus, in Kelly 2011, 2,
I there is such a thing as sound art, the message` must be grounded in the sounds. ,1he
sounds` are not be mistaken with sounds-in-themseles` or simply sound.`, A theory o
sound art must take account o sound art as av art of .ovva., where sounds are heard in all their
sociality. A theory o sound art is ultimately justiied by its ability to support the description
and production o soundworks at the leel where indiidual sounds matter. Perhaps the only
way to aoid a theory o sound art that simply reiterates the demands o art theory, or music
theory ,or that matter,, is to require that it meet the only set o demands that matter-those
adequate to the unaoidable, unruly, unashionable thing that we used to call the work.`
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.&01#
1.
http:,,www.channel4.com,news,turner-prize-susan-philipsz-wins-prestigious-art-award
2.
http:,,www.independent.co.uk,arts-entertainment,art,eatures,michael-gloer-three-cheers-or-sound-artists-but-not-
this-one-2153048.html
3.
I say Duchampian` since Duchamp does not use the term non-retinal.` Rather, he says that his art depended on
things other than the retina.` See Cabanne and Duchamp, 39 and passim.
4.
In 1be 1rvtb iv Paivtivg, Derrida analyzes the arergov to draw attention to the problem o drawing an absolute boundary
between intrinsic and extrinsic eatures o a work, like that between the image on the canas and its rame. le argues that
the arergov ollows the logic o the supplement, that it operates, without being a part o |the work| yet without being
absolutely extrinsic to it.` ,Derrida, 55, Neer simply outside or inside, the Derridean arergov, gies itsel oer to stabilize
and legitimate the integrity and autonomy o the work, yet, i the work requires such legitimation rom outside,` it cannot
be simply autonomous.
5.
Instead o appealing to musicological sources, Kim-Cohen relies on the \alter Pater`s ormula that all the arts aspire to
the condition o music. Pater is cited twice, plus two reerences to romanticism` that allude to Pater`s statement.
6.
See, or example, McLuhan and Carpenter ,1960, or Jonas ,1966,.
.
Voegelin is alluding to Schaeer`s acousmatic reduction. See Schaeer ,1966, and, or commentary, Kane ,200,.
8.
Krauss ,1985,.
9.
Greenberg ,1993,.
10.
In this respect, Kim-Cohen ollows in the ootsteps o Douglas Kahn ,1991,. lor a salient comparison, see Kahn`s
reading o \oko Ono`s work.
11.
1o hold to the dichotomy between sounds and society is to concede too much to the theories o Pierre Schaeer. \hy
should someone as critical o Schaeer as Kim-Cohen simply inert the alue he places on reduced listening ,ecovter reaivte,
1he Schaeerian position is not oercome by inerting its alues, it is oercome by arguing against its premises. lor more
on Schaeer, see Kane ,200,.
12.
1o accurately characterize Kim-Cohen`s argument, I should note that he does not consider rock and roll as Music ,writ
large,. Like the sonic arts it seeks the extramusical. Rock and roll separates itsel rom the instantiated presumptions o
\estern music.` ,142, \hile |\estern composed music| goes to great lengths to exclude the extramusical rom its ield o
concern, the |rock and roll| courts it and eleates it to the point o all but excluding the properly musical.` 1he repetitious
nature o rock and roll means that it ultimately must appeal, not to the ear, but to a broader sense ,in both meanings o the
word, o experience. Rock and roll is about the conrontation o an audience with a perormer. It is understood that both
parties may be playing a role, and yet the interaction is nor more and no less real` than the social interactions o eeryday
lie. Separated rom day-to-day existence and shown o the consequence o actions taken there, rock and roll allows a
playing out o desires, ears, and proocations.` ,144, \et, Kim-Cohen`s claim that rock and roll does not ultimately appeal
to the ear, that it is part o a non-cochlear practice, that it embraces the social and cultural ,i.e., the extramusical,, is belied
the moment he starts describing.
13.
Adorno himsel had little patience or that ideology: Music is ideology insoar as it asserts itsel as an ontological being-
in-itsel, beyond society`s tensions.` ,Adorno 2006, 100,
--
Adorno, 1heodor \. 196. Introduction to the sociology o music. New \ork: Seabury Press.
Adorno, 1heodor \. 2006. Pbito.ob, of ver vv.ic. Minnesota: Uniersity o Minnesota press.
Cabanne, Pierre, and Marcel Duchamp. 191. Diatogve. ritb Marcet Dvcbav. New \ork: Viking Press.
Cox, Christoph, and Daniel \arner, ed. 2004. .vaio cvttvre: reaaivg. iv voaerv vv.ic. New \ork: Continuum.
Derrida, Jacques. 198. 1be trvtb iv aivtivg. Chicago: Uniersity o Chicago Press.
Greenberg, Clement. 1993. 1be cottectea e..a,. ava critici.v, rot. 1, ed. John O`Brian.. Chicago: Uniersity o Chicago Press.
lansen, Mark B. N. 2006. ^er bito.ob, for ver veaia. Cambridge, Mass: MI1.
legarty, Paul. 200. ^oi.e,vv.ic: a bi.tor,. New \ork: Continuum.
Jonas, lans. 1966. 1he Nobility o Sight` in 1be bevovevov of tife: torara a bito.obicat biotog,. New \ork: larper & Row.
!"#$%&'(&)$*+ &- #&"./ *-0 *./ 0(1 /1!*./# &2 *-0 0(1&-3 <C
Kahn, Douglas. 1999. ^oi.e, rater, veat: a bi.tor, of .ovva iv tbe art.. Cambridge, Mass: MI1.
Kane, Brian. 200. L`Objet Sonore Maintenant: Pierre Schaeer, sound objects and the phenomenological reduction`.
Orgavi.ea ovva. 12 ,1,: 15-24.
Kelly, Caleb. 2011. ovva. London: \hitechapel Gallery.
Kim-Cohen-Seth. 2009. v tbe btiv/ of av ear: torara a vovcocbtear .ovic art. New \ork: Continuum.
Krauss, Rosalind L. 1985. 1be origivatit, of tbe aravtgarae ava otber voaervi.t v,tb.. Cambridge, Mass: MI1 Press.
Krauss, Rosalind L. 1990. In the Blink o An Lye` in Daid Carroll, ed. 1be tate. of tbeor,`: bi.tor,, art, ava criticat ai.covr.e.
New \ork: Columbia Uniersity Press.
LaBelle, Brandon. 2006. ac/grovva voi.e: er.ectire. ov .ovva art. New \ork: Continuum.
Licht, Alan. 200. ovva art: be,ova vv.ic, betreev categorie.. New \ork, N.\.: Rizzoli International Publications.
McLuhan, Marshal and Ldmund Carpenter. 1960. Acoustic Space` in toratiov. iv covvvvicatiov. Boston: Beacon Press.
Schaeer, Pierre. 1966. 1raite ae. ob;et. vv.icav, e..ai ivterai.citive.. Paris: Lditions du Seuil.
Voegelin, Salom. 2010. i.tevivg to voi.e ava .itevce: torara. a bito.ob, of .ovva art. New \ork: Continuum.
Brian Kane is Assistant Proessor o Music at \ale Uniersity. le is currently writing a book on acousmatic sound.
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