Most of us have, at some point, wished we listened better. Spanish installation artist Marc Vilanova knows the power of listening from his years as an experimental musician, playing the saxophone in front of crowds across Europe. But most people are not listening to a waterfall, an earthquake, or a volcano. This is not a slight towards a volcano: we aren’t voluntarily tuning it out. Our bodies can’t hear the frequencies that nature speaks to us at, because our ears can only pick up sounds from 20Hz to 2000Hz.
Any frequency beyond that is “infrasound” at the lowest point or “ultrasound” at the highest point.” However, we can feel it. Vilanova was recording a waterfall, once, for an installation called Cascade, and felt a pressure in his chest he couldn’t explain. Then, he looked at his recording device and saw that he was standing at the highest frequency of sound. This moment transformed his relationship to sound and formed the basis for his art practice that he’s bringing to the Mattress Factory on March 28 for his yearlong exhibition.
Marc Vilanova Brings Mystical Sound to the Mattress Factory
“These things are mystical, and we don’t have the words to describe them,” Vilanova said. “We have to feel it with our bodies, but they’re things we cannot perceive.” For his newest work at the Mattress Factory, as-of-yet untitled, he used geophones to record infrasounds from deep within the earth. He visited mines in the Appalachian region surrounding Pittsburgh when no one was else was there to be able to record in silence. The exhibition, opening on March 28, will consist of three different sonic experiences where Vilanova takes his recording, plays them on speakers, and then uses fiber optic cables to show the soundwaves reacting to a physical object. He’s blacked out the walls and the windows on the fourth floor of the Mattress Factory, and will have carpets for people to lay down or sit on to experience the exhibition.
“I want to pose questions, but I don’t have the answers to them,” he said. “That’s for scientists or for environmentalists. The experience of my work is very sensual, not just something to see and read the wall text and then go to the next thing. You perceive the piece with your body, and you can connect with it even if you don’t read anything on the wall.” He does hint at the environmental implications of sound pollution, how birds use infrasound for migration and get confused by the soundwaves planes or WiFi signals make. But he’s not interested in preaching to people, rather, he wants them to experience for themselves that there are things beyond their perception happening all around them, all the time.
Merging Science and Technology
Though Vilanova sees what he does as creative, it’s not all romantic. He crossed out a work-in-progress sign in the installation space that said “This area is closed. Making art in progress” and wrote “working” over the “making art” section on a piece of masking tape. Installation art of Vilanova’s genre is often unglamorous and highly technical, requiring an understanding of science and a willingness to work with what you have.
But during the process, he focused on what the core of the show would be. “I really want people to feel welcome in the space and feel like they can spend some time there,” he said. Installation work has a reputation for being overly heady, inaccessible, or downright unpleasant. But Vilanova hopes people can spend ten minutes, if only that, really experiencing the work. Where many installation artists can indeed live up to the stereotype in their descriptions of the work, Vilanova is earnest and openhearted.
The Power of Listening
“I felt a little embarrassed about my experience with the waterfall, sharing it with people,” Vilanova said. “That people might think ‘oh, he’s just a mystical guy.’” But he now embraces the mysticism, magic, and poetry that comes from deep listening, both to the world around us and to each other. “People with good listening skills can make better conversation or even get political radicals to agree with each other,” he noted. In the pre-installation phase, the speakers on the ground look like a field of small, metallic flowers. What Vilanova does can seem like a kind of magic, but it is science.
Though visiting Vilanova’s installation won’t be a traditional museum experience of seeing with your eyes, the works asks you to open your heart and be vulnerable to an experience you might not understand. It can be uncomfortable to situate yourself in your body and have a sensory experience, especially when so much of modern life disconnects us from it. But Vilanova’s show will be up through March 2026, so you have plenty of time to go, even if to spend just ten minutes.
Story by Emma Riva
Photo courtesy of Marc Vilanova
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