In her practice, Los Angeles–based artist Jacqueline Kiyomi Gork (b. 1982, Long Beach, CA) engages sound as both conceptual and literal material. Marking the artist’s first solo museum exhibition, Jacqueline Kiyomi Gork, features a new sound-based installation. Building on her ongoing explorations into sound as an architectural form, Kiyomi Gork has transformed the ICA LA Project Room into a maze, revealing the integral—yet invisible—role that sound plays in shaping one’s perception.

Titled Into/Loving/Against/Lost in the Loop (2023), the installation features an electronic beat generated from live audio pulled from the Milford Graves: Fundamental Frequency exhibition on view in the nearby galleries. Inside Kiyomi Gork’s maze, the rhythmic pulse of the beat is amplified and distorted through spatial and material interventions, such as speakers and sound blankets, reflecting the artist’s sculptural use of objects commonly associated with noise control. The circuitous structure of the maze underscores the feedback loop inherent to hearing, wherein, according to Kiyomi Gork, “What you hear affects how you move and how you move affects how you hear.” As its title suggests, Into/Loving/Against/ Lost in the Loop describes the multifaceted nature of the feedback loop, speaking to simultaneous sensations of agency and loss of control, collectivity and isolation. In the exhibition, soundwaves vibrate through the body and orient the visitor as they navigate the maze’s twists and turns—at once transported away from, and brought back to, their own embodied experience. In calling attention to the somatic quality of sound, Kiyomi Gork blurs the distinctions between audience, performer, audio, and architecture to create a heightened awareness of the dynamics of perception.

FURTHER LISTENING

To accompany Into/Loving/Against/Lost in the Loop (2023), Kiyomi Gork created a playlist combining a selection of the the artist’s key sonic references, ranging from well-known pioneers of experimental and electronic music like Pauline Oliveros to friends and frequent collaborators, like Kingdom (aka Ezra Rubin).

Tracklist:
1. Valencia, Attacca Quartet
2. Bye Bye Butterfly, Pauline Oliveros
3. Can't Fall, Fay
4. Tears in the Club, Kingdom
5. Freeze Me, Kingdom & Semma
6. Flights of Fancy, Maggi Payne
7. ALPHA, Haswell & Hecker
8. In the Night Sky, Maggi Payne

Listen Here

Click Here To View The Institute Of Contemporary Art Museum News - March 10, 2023