A ‘sound keeper’ is someone who puts sound under safe keeping, and in Chinese, the character for “keeping” (sau2) puns with the character for ‘seeking’, ‘hunting’, or ‘collecting’ (sau2). In this project, we try to find out how sound keepers and sound seekers relate themselves to sound with materials in The Library by soundpocket.

This project categorizes sounds into ‘sound wave’, ‘music’ and ‘language’. ‘Sound wave’ refers to sound that is represented by the language of physics; it is without emotions and subjective meaning, like a Mathematical formula. ‘Music’ or simply sound is sound without the content of language, but it can influence human emotions, like instrumental music and sighs. ‘Language’ is communication through sound; it has the most complicated structure of sound among the three. It not only carries meaning, but it is also a system of thinking.

We take two opposite extremes for each category as two gravitational poles – “not listen<>listen”, “unpleasant to listen<>pleasant to listen”, “do not understand<>understand”. We look for someone of each extreme in the way they deal with sound in daily life. These are our Sound Keepers. From a hearing-impaired person, a Zen master, a rocker, an air conditioning technician, an insurance agent to a hypnotherapist etc., they will participate in a series of experiments for The Library.

- Pak Sheung-chuen, Curator

「守音人」是把聲音守住的人，其同音字「搜音人」是指搜集聲音的人，在這個項目我們嘗試通過聲音圖書館來找出「他們」和聲音的關係。我們把聲音拆分成三部份：聲波／音樂／語言。「聲波」只從物理角度去理解聲音，完全抽離感情和主觀的意思，像一條數學公式；「音樂」或純聲音是沒有語言內容的聲音，但能影響人的情緒，如純音樂和嘆息；「語言」通過聲音來溝通，是聲音的最複雜結構，它本身除了是意思的載體，也是一種思考系統。我們在每一個範圍各找兩個極端，作為引力：「聽不見＜＞聽見」／「不好聽＜＞好聽」／「不明白＜＞明白」。我們為每個「極端」尋找一名化身，他們在日常處境中從事和聲音有關職業的人，他們就是「守音人」。由聽障人士、禪師、搖滾樂手、冷氣機技工、保險經紀到催眠師等等，他們會為聲音圖書館做一系列聆聽的實驗。

- 策展人 白雙全