#bridollas

[brianasechoes]

(bridollas)

Sketch #4: Gerta Dieffenbachia

Plants are very important to me. I always start the year by buying new plants, expanding my little plant family and work with plants in the lab. Since I live in a big house with 6 people, I put 2 large plants in our living room. This piece focuses on Gerta, the Dieffenbachia that sits in the corner of our living room. She’s been through a lot, along with her sister Paola the Palm, going through the rough, cold Providence winter and dealing with dryness coming from the heat (which she sits right next to). Not only that, but my housemates don’t really consciously care about the plants’ well being - which is fair because I did bring them into the space, but I’m only one person and it’s hard being a single parent.

My mother always told me it was important to talk to your plants, because they can hear you and they grow better when you interact with them. Because of her, I talk to my plants, and caress their leaves when I water them to pass on that bit of love they need to grow. This piece explores the possibility of plant consciousness, and what my little plant child might say if she could speak and dream.

[brianasechoes]

Desor-tren, Keyword: Disorder/Experience

For my soundsite sketch, I decided to explore the sounds of the MBTA commuter line to and from Boston. There is no piece of this project that is still, the consecutive 2 minute track is the train in motion, layered with sounds from passengers, including myself. I chose to frame this piece with the keyword Disorder and Experience, as a representation of the auditory experience of a passenger on a train like this.

The background track of the train in motion serves as a constant for the listener, a familiar sound to cling to and focus on, as the sounds of the busy train take over. The piece begins with the train leaving the station, followed by the shuffling and footsteps of a passenger trying to find a seat. We hear the train conductor discussing tickets with passengers as the listener settles in with music. This, however, is not enough to mask the disorder surrounding you, representing the distorted listening one experiences in a moving space. The announcements serve as brief moments of extreme clarity - you know where you are for the few minutes at the stop, but this feeling is fleeting and soon enters the listeners’ realm of passive listening. As the piece ends, the music fades away as do the rhythmic sounds of the moving train - representing the end of the trip. The train “sighs,” almost in relief at the end of its journey. I ended the piece with a soundclip of Gio saying “se pega” which translates to “it sticks” - as the disorientation from the trip and traveling “sticks” to you, even when you are still.

[brianasechoes]

Title: We are Angry, and that’s okay

Anger is necessary, it is unavoidable, and it is universal. Yet, anger is policed or dismissed if it is felt by Black and brown womxn. In this work, eight women describe the feeling and their dealings with anger. It opens with society’s portrayal and response to Black and brown women’s anger - usually violent dismissal, silencing or demonization. From this point, the work is a descent. The women describe the height of their anger over the sounds of a thunderstorm, but there is so much more to it. As the trembling thunder moves into the soft crash of waves on a beach, the women discuss their emotions before and after experiencing something angry or frustrating, oftentimes mentioning sadness, guilt, and isolation. Finally, as the waves turn into nightlife, anger is released and transforms into laughter. The image I chose to contextualize this work is

This work is a practice of humanization, active listening, and understanding, and aims to reevaluate and reframe anger as a deeply personal and complex experience. It puts anger in a sonic framework that challenges the notion of “the angry black woman,” and represents it as a fluid and changing emotional process. In the context of this class, I think this piece relates to our many discussions on representation in sound work. I knew I wanted to do a piece on anger, but going a step further and focusing on folks with marginalized identities was really important for me and for this project, as these are the people whose voices are the most policed. I think that making sound art and radio work for and by folks with marginalized identities should always be a concern, we should always be asking ourselves what voices we are choosing to feature and why. I believe the strength it conveyed in this piece is largely due to the amazing women I chose to feature, and who its intended audience is.

[brianasechoes]

For this project, I chose to remediate a book of poetry, Animal Fiero y Tierno by Ángelamaría Dávila. This was the first piece of work by the Puerto Rican poet, and the first book of poetry I’ve read in Spanish - a feat that I wanted to commemorate. Dávila draws many parallels between the natural world and human emotion/actions, which is a common thread throughout the collection. The work is split into 4 regions, which I mimicked in this piece, and each region tackles a different theme. However, when I viewed this piece as a whole, it told me a story of transformation, so I named this piece Metamorfosis.

The first region is title “aire” or “air,” and the poems explore themes of sadness and placelessness. The excerpt from the text read in this region translates to: “Sad animal, I am a sad animal still and walking through a globe of earth.” The second region is titled “Mundo Musgo angelito” or “Moss world angel.” This region is my favorite of the collection, as Dávila explores love, sensuality, and longing through metaphors with the natural world. The third section “La cólera correcta” is about anger - a lot of it coming from the political relationship between PR and the US. The final section of the collection, “Este monton de cosas,” culminates the piece through the exploration and discovery of place in the world.

In my remediation, I took these themes in as an exploration of self-growth and discovery, and thought a lot of queerness while editing it. Like Dávila, I drew parallels between myself and the natural world, displayed in section 2 when I overlay a plant being watered and me drinking a glass of water. This piece represents a lot for me - a continuous cycle of discovery - crumbling, building, crumbling, building, but ending this piece with my laughter was extremely empowering. It serves as a reminder of positivity despite the disarray and “este monton de cosas” (this heap of things).