Germain’s research—he is an artist active in the arena of the visual arts and music, as well as dance and theatre—stems precisely from a line of thinking about the relation between sound and space, about spatiality, and plasticity, and what he calls the “motionless time” of sound. His intallations are not spaces filled with sounds, but places defined by sound: auditiory topographies to be experienced by passing through them. Produced in exhibition venues and in public places, based on a palette of sounds first recorded and then “sculpted”, Germain’s installations are discreetly, almost stealthily, incorporated in environments; they do not impose themselves, and play on anonymity and thresholds of perception. […]
Germain’s research—he is an artist active in the arena of the visual arts and music, as well as dance and theatre—stems precisely from a line of thinking about the relation between sound and space, about spatiality, and plasticity, and what he calls the “motionless time” of sound. His intallations are not spaces filled with sounds, but places defined by sound: auditiory topographies to be experienced by passing through them. Produced in exhibition venues and in public places, based on a palette of sounds first recorded and then “sculpted”, Germain’s installations are discreetly, almost stealthily, incorporated in environments; they do not impose themselves, and play on anonymity and thresholds of perception. His most recent projects usually occupy “natural” places, or, rather, landscapes shaped by man, in order to explore the sound environment, invite people to listen, seek out relations between nature and culture, and sow doubt by introducing almost imperceptible changes into the site…
Excerpt from the interview La temporalité “immobile” du son : Hughes Germain, with Elena Biserna, december 2019