Groundbreaking Installation Turns Art Gallery into a Musical Instrument

A visitor to the Bowdoin College Museum of Art’s Walker Gallery may soon be greeted by unusual sights and sounds. In clear contravention of usual gallery rules that require patrons to keep twelve inches away from any artwork, visitors might be seen holding their smart phones close up against a large-scale wall drawing, a variety of sounds emitting from their devices as they glide across the surface. It’s all part of a collaborative, groundbreaking, site-specific, multimedia art installation involving four artists. The striking visual component, adorning all four walls of the gallery, is by linn meyers, the 2018-2019 halley k harrisburg ’90 and Michael Rosenfeld Artist-in-Residence at the College. The acrylic ink wall drawing, titled Let’s Get Lost, was created alongside an interactive sound installation, Listening Glass. It’s the product of a two-year collaboration with interactive and audio artists Rebecca Bray, James Bigbee Garver, and Josh Knowles. P.S. Don’t worry if you do not possess a smartphone. The museum can lend you one with the required app preloaded onto it, so you can fully experience the installation.