Susan Philipsz: SURROUND ME

Cycled around the desolate centre of the financial district in London searching for Philipsz sound installations. It was beautiful to wander around trying to find this secluded location and hearing the song from a main road which would lead us into a secluded area. The work itself made all sounds in the city heightened and navigated us to new locations which would have alternately been undiscovered or easily looked over....

Susan Philipsz: SURROUND ME

A Song Cycle for the City of London
Saturdays & Sundays only, 10am - 5pm
9 October 2010 - 2 January 2011

At the weekends an eerie quiet descends on the City of London, in offices, squares, churchyards and streets, broken by the occasional sound of traffic and church bells. The silence of the city has inspired artist Susan Philipsz’s first commission in the capital. Her unaccompanied voice resonates through empty streets around the Bank of England, across postwar walkways and medieval alleyways and along the banks of the River Thames.

SURROUND ME: A Song Cycle for the City of London takes inspiration from the heightened presence of the human voice in Elizabethan London.