Ceola Tunstall-Behrens is a multidisciplinary artist working in the fields of experience art and performance. In her practice she uses the medium of the voice to investigate different aspects of our existence, evoking questions on being human. Through her work she is continuously exploring how sound can hold space and often translates her ideas into performances and architectures of sound. By using audiovisual tools to design and create experiences, her works range from installations to audio guides to experimental vocal performances and radio.
What is my voice when it no longer resounds in my body? - ‘What is my voice when it no longer resounds in my body?’ is a confrontation with the continuation of human existence through digital technology.
It questions the existential meaning of voice cloning technology - can it go beyond being a phoney mimic and just a representation and exist as an extension of the self? It also questions the plausibility of this phenomenon - how is it convincing, surprising and what are its limits?
Through the exploration of voice cloning technology, the work expresses doubt that the true essence of a voice, and by proxy, a person, character and personality, can be cloned and kept alive through digital means. The ownership of the voice and its contextualisation within a body override any digital existence.
This work is part of an ongoing research into digital immortality which explores how far humans can extend their existence on earth through digital means.
“Well, we’ll ring each other up another day” - I listen to the telephone ring,
waiting for him to pick up the phone.
When did we last speak,
I am not sure.
I loved our conversation where he started singing,
telling me about his summer holidays as a child.
He has so many stories
that I will
never hear.
As he gets older his life
becomes smaller.
It becomes thinner.
It becomes
fixed.
He talks of things close to him.
Of the things he can
see
and feel.
The same daily things.
If I capture him
before time has ended,
before I have
no control over
it, then
I have things I can keep.
I want to know it all.
I want to
hold it all,
in his voice.
Recorded fragments from telephone conversations between a father and a daughter weave their way throughout a body of space. The listener experiences the immaterial presence of someone, or something. A moment, a relationship. A space, a time. “Well, we'll ring each other up another day” is an audio installation where the narrative and immateriality of the work transitions the focus of attention away from the visual and physical. Instead it creates an object of empty space that simulates intimacy and introspection, that de-centres the gaze. https://soundcloud.com/ceolatb/well-well-ring-each-other-up-another-day_stereo_mix
What If All That Was Left Of Us Was Sound - A sound poem - https://soundcloud.com/ceolatb/what-if-all-that-was-left-of-us-was-sound
To my Digital Heir - To My Digital Heir is a performance work that stemmed from a prediction. Ray Kurzweil, an inventor, thinker and futurist and the Director of Engineering at Google, believes that by 2045, AI (Artificial Intelligence) will surpass human beings as the smartest and most capable life forms on the planet. Because of this, humanity will have reached The Singularity where man and machine will be able to merge and we will be able to upload our minds to a computer.
