Artists invite you to experience sound beyond the ear

▲ The exhibition is complemented by workshops and other activities. Photo by María Luisa Severiano

Fabiola Palapa Quijas

La Jornada Newspaper, Tuesday, July 22, 2025, p. 4

An immersive sensory experience combining sound art, sculpture, and performance is offered by artist Iván Navarrete in the exhibition Suspensions in the Rain: Resonant Bodies, which opened last Saturday at the National Center for the Arts (Cenart).

The opening began with the sound-sculpture installation Suspensions, created in 2017, in which five hanging aluminum plates emitted sounds when touched or rubbed, resonating in the space adjacent to the Cenart fountain.

As the sounds played, dancers from the Morelos Arts Center simulated bird-like flapping motions with their arms. Their movements grew in intensity, as if the sound had filled them with a liberating energy. They rose from the ground, their bodies soaring as if they were flying, and then, with playful curiosity, they began to strike the aluminum plates with objects like bouncing balls, crunching rice, drumming beans, and drumsticks, as if they were musicians.

Navarrete's idea was to create an expansive sound experience, a listening experience that wasn't limited to the ear but extended to the entire body, allowing the audience to play without the rigidity required of a professional musician.

The exhibition consists of the installations Sounds Under the Tree (2014), Suspensions (2017), and Everyday Sound Universes (2023). This proposal is not just about listening, but about making listening a collective, corporeal, and imaginative experience. Here, the boundaries between sculpture and instrument, spectator and performer, dissolve to give rise to sensitive ways of inhabiting space with sound.

Iván Navarrete, who has a musical background, explained that the pieces are in an unstable state so that the entire object resonates. Each piece is suspended to foster this sound .

Everyday Sound Universes, the second installation, located on the Paseo de las Jacarandas at Cenart, is a display of mobile pendants with repurposed pans as bells. Visitors passing through the corridor always have the opportunity to touch any of the pans and discover the universe of sounds generated by these objects, which are so close to our everyday lives.

According to the artist, the installation is based on the principles of the Plan, instituted by Martí Ruiz in Barcelona, and adopted in Mexico by PanGamelanMX. This piece and its activations are offered as a posthumous tribute to Héctor Tobón, artist and founder of PanGamelanMX.

"The intention of the sculptures is to connect with the environment and the audience; it's an invitation to a sound experience that isn't determined by the need for musical knowledge, but rather by the playful aspect, approaching sound through what I can do with my body, the movements I begin to generate that become sounds."

That is to say, as I begin to discover myself, I will discover sound and transform my surroundings; that is very important in these pieces, which also somehow affect the soundscape of the Cenart , the artist told La Jornada.

Curator Paola Eguiluz commented that the installations are located outdoors, rather than in a permanent gallery, to offer Cenart visitors a tour where they can interact with the sound sculptures and the surroundings.

The three installations are on display in the central corridor, next to the fountain, on the Paseo de las Jacarandas, and in the green areas of the Cenart (79 Río Churubusco, Calzada de Tlalpan). They can be visited until August 31st during the venue's opening hours.

The exhibition is complemented by activities such as the workshop Pan Orchestra: An Approach to Indonesian Music with Kitchen Utensils, taught by Iván Navarrete and Enrique Morales Aguirre, from July 28 to 30, from 4 to 7 p.m. in the MAC room of the Multimedia Center.

As part of Museum Night, the piece Everyday Sound Universes will be performed on July 30th at 7 pm in the Paseo de las Jacarandas. On August 27th at 6 pm in the green areas (next to the School of Music) the collective jam Session under the Tree will take place, while on Sunday the 31st at 2 pm in the Central Corridor, Paseo de las Jacarandas and green areas, Nuube is scheduled, with the participation of Loretta Ratto, Samantha Canchola, Lucía R., Sofía Escamilla, Astrid RuNam, Paulina Grang, Pamela Herz, Daniela Solís, Thelma Asencio, Monserrat Cotello, Carla González and Fryda Magaña.