Soft sounds can be hard to hear, while loud sounds can be very reassuring. This is not always due to the sounds themselves, but also to our response. How we respond is influenced by our physical condition, personal experiences, social circumstances, cultural conventions and political choices. Together with artists, musicians and activists, curator Linnea Semmerling investigated the impact of such responses on the Rotterdam soundscape.
The exhibition There is no party so noisy as the one you're not invited to shows how the sound culture in the city has been determined by specific mechanisms to distinguish between desired and undesirable sound since the nineteenth century. The artworks, objects and policy documents in the exhibition make clear how dominant ways of listening—such as white listening, wealthy listening and listening without a hearing impairment—are used as the norm and are enforced with a range of bureaucratic procedures and policy instruments. From signs against singing in public places to regulations against popular folk musical instruments; from a registration form that is supposed to regulate the honking at Turkish wedding processions to the policy of banning teenagers from public places by means of an ultrasonic beep.
How could citizens, elected representatives, civil servants and companies become more sensitive to the diversity in the Rotterdam soundscape? Could we learn to deal with sound differently, beyond the dividing lines that current policy draws through the city? Could we respond more sensitively if we learned to listen more empathetically?