If you’ve been in Ball Hall at the beginning of this semester, you might have noticed the operatic voices or occasional sound bytes that drift down the hall. These noises are part of the “From Static to Oscillatory (and Back Again)” exhibit by artist Greg Pond.
This exhibit, sponsored by the Tennessee Arts Commission’s Arts Project Support, is a glimpse at how art can be translated across different mediums. In this exhibition, Pond uses sculpture and sound, along with two and three-dimensional displays, to portray that idea.
“Through this work, I’ve been looking at ideas of architecture, utopia ideas, their sense of how we perceive unusual or things that exist beyond our ontological orientations and trying to compress them into these different places,” said Pond. “So, sound can become sculpture, sculpture can become sound. Creating a certain fluidity between different media and materials so that within the opportunity that has been given to me with this work, I have been able to put a bunch of different works that all express this idea in different ways across a couple of galleries.”
Pond’s inspiration for these pieces of work come from across the globe in Ireland, spanning from a time of over ten years.
“I had to replace architecture for sculpture then generate sound within it to become the sculpture, and that forced me to think about what sound was,” Pond said.
He also elaborated on the purpose and functionality of the work seen within the exhibit.
“Those are sculptures set up to project sound in very specific patterns and directions,” Pond said. “We worked with a soprano opera singer to create these very specific sound gestures that relate to the dance and relate to the interweaving of the sculpture forms that are based on architecture or notions that kind of blend all of these ideas.”
Beyond being an artist, Pond is a professor at The University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee. He believes that having students engage and interact with art on campus is beneficial and meaningful.
“Art is this place where different ideas, different disciplines, especially in an academic situation, where non-connected ideas find new ways to connect,” Pond said. “If art has any agency at all, it’s to take the world that is familiar and make it slightly unfamiliar. Not so strange and so far off the wire that we cannot recognize it…We see the world with slightly fresh eyes.”
Pond’s exhibit will be showcased at the Slocumb Galleries until Sept. 27. A reception will be held Friday, Sept. 27 starting at 5 p.m. in Ball Hall, where the artist will be present to talk to and welcome guests.
