Fugue Zones

In Fugue Zones, artists Steve Goodman, Jeremy Toussaint-Baptiste, and DeForrest Brown Jr. dive deep into the provocative intersection of curiosity, technology, and power. This immersive installation invites visitors to question the ways in which audio devices - once designed for military use - have made their way into the consumer world, now reshaping our sensory experiences. Through the careful placement of re-engineered consumer and military-grade audio systems throughout the Canary Test space, the installation explores the ruptures of curiosity that occur when these two worlds collide.

The gallery pulses with the disorienting presence of Long Range Acoustic Devices (LRADs), Holosonic parametric speakers, bass backpacks, noise-cancelling headphones, and deep, rumbling subwoofers. These varied systems create a surreal soundscape where sounds of all kinds - atmospheric, vertical, horizontal, and embodied - overlap and diverge, forming unique “zones” of experience. Visitors are transported from moments of sensory overload, where booming subwoofer tones reverberate throughout the body, to near-total silence, where the absence of sound becomes just as unnerving.

As curiosity drives the consumer to engage with this hybrid military-entertainment tech, Fugue Zones amplifies how these powerful, multi-layered sound experiences attract and repel in unexpected ways. The installation not only compels an intimate exploration of the devices but also subtly critiques the evolution of sound systems from tools of control to everyday consumer objects. Each visitor’s engagement with the space becomes a fleeting, personal encounter, a reflection on how technology shapes, disrupts, and entices our curiosity.