Behind the wall - listening party and project launch

4pm – Sylvana d’Angelo and Anezka Minarikova discuss the exhibition & book launch
5pm (sharp) – Lauren Marsden: The Sounds Of Your Ancestral Past

Lauren Marsden’s audio work, The Sound of Your Ancestral Past, produced specifically for the exhibition Behind the Wall /In Front of the Wall, is composed as a sonic reflection of the exhibition curators’ personal archives. Using a collection of family photographs and artifacts as a guide, the soundtrack is comprised entirely of appropriated audio clips including pop music, stock field recordings and Foley sound effects. The Sound of Your Ancestral Past offers a drifting narrative through imagined personal histories while taking its listeners through calm pastoral settings, strange domestic scenes, and heated public protests.

The Sounds of Your Ancestral Past
Available for download –

Behind the Wall /In Front of the Wall is a consideration of two families’ recent past, against a backdrop of political change and economic globalization. Co-curators Minarikova and d’Angelo explore issues surrounding religious, political, and personal freedom, through artifacts of their families’ lived experience.

Anezka Minarikova‘s exhibition is a self-reflection and contemplation of the impact of mapping my family history in the context of the political and historical events of the second half of the 20th century in the Czech Republic. Personal objects bear an imprint of family members’ lives. The items that no longer serve their original purpose are witnesses of forgotten conversations and events, and as such they become artifacts. The single items are illustrations of memories and emotions, together forming a whole containing several decades of family history. These personal histories exist against the backdrop of national struggle and transformation, and also comprise the curator’s journey of self-knowledge through knowledge of familial, national, and global histories.

Through a series of interviews Sylvana d’Angelo got to know the last three generations of her family and asked everyone to send items describing their shared experiences. Despite their drastically different lifestyles and beliefs they all convey similar responses. What emerges is a three-generation struggle with immigration and integration leading to a retreat into religious faith, and separation from the secular world, despite the freedom of choice offered by Western society. The items in this collection embody an experience with restriction and separation, viewed from the perspective of five family members.

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