Listening to Noise and Silence: Towards the Philosophy of Sound Art

How will our perception of reality and judgments about it change if we listen to the noise and silence that surrounds us?

This question is the nerve of the research by Swiss theorist Salomea Fögelin, dedicated to a comprehensive analysis of listening and various manifestations of sound art in the second half of the 20th century — American minimalism, concrete music, field recordings, sound installations, raves, and much more. Drawing on the phenomenology of perception and critical theory, Fögelin reveals the foundations of her philosophical thought: according to her, listening can offer new ways of affective cognition and feeling, as well as a renewal of the horizons of existence, full of fluid resonances, refrains, and echoic reflections.

Before us lies a text that challenges established academic molds — the incompleteness and ephemerality of sound requires a special "sonorous" writing that resists rational principles. Despite the fragmentary and whimsical nature of Fögelin's reasoning, it is precisely through such writing and attention to auditory presence that we find ourselves capable of experiencing wonder in the face of the world.