Among The Petals / Ben Frost

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Among The Petals
Spotlight on Ben Frost’s new art work

Spotlight on Ben Frost’s new sound installation, “Among the Petals”, a monumental skeletal structure on display at the Momentary in Bentonville earlier this year. Essay by Maria Abramenko focused on the aesthetic analysis of Frost’s work.

Artist’s installation “Among the Petals” at the Momentary Museum, which drew to a close this past spring, was an exploration of sound technology’s plainly apparent physicality.

This vertical sound sculpture, a 20-metres spiral of 22 speakers, functioned as a precisely aligned array which transcended its conventional meaning by becoming more than its visible parts. The structure, resembling a twisted DNA helix or vertebrae, challenged perceptions by transforming mundane audio equipment into an emergent lifeform, animated by sound.

Frost’s synthetic soundscape, derived from natural and elemental forces, permeated the installation, imbuing it with a sense of an interconnected organisms existing within and despite the human-altered environment. This sonic backbone evoked a reimagined nature, asserting its presence amidst the industrial materials of steel, cables and copper that constituted the speakers.

The sound of “Among the Petals” composed for this installation, is another loud and distinct Frostian creation. The synthesised audio, inspired by natural elements, created a hypnotic auditory experience, transforming the space into a living, breathing entity.

The sound composition underscored the organic form of the sculpture, making the acoustic visual components inseparable yet independently significant.

Frost’s previous work, “A Predatory Chord,” presented at the Megaron Athens, also delved into the visceral properties of sound. There, he explores the intersection of sound and space which engendered this oeuvre.

“Among the Petals” continued this exploration, utilising a similar PA system to enliven otherwise inanimate components, asserting sound as an inherently sculptural medium.Now that it has ended, “Among the Petals” at the Momentary Museum remains a meditation on sound’s materiality and its integration into the physical realm.

Frost’s installation invited contemplation of the unseen, urging a reevaluation of the registers that constitute our auditory senses, enhanced by the elementary vibrations, akin to tribal trance-like all enveloping sensation so powerful and piercing, it feels like an outer body experience reminiscent of stimulus below the threshold of consciousness.