Fuubuutsushi-Engramm

“The sound of wind in the leaves. It’s autumn. The sound of the swing creaking. The wind through the fabric. The color of the trees. A police siren? No, a barking dog. The grass under your feet. When was the last time we saw each other? Can you remember? You don’t remember. Like everything else.”
Some memories come back to us. Others escape us. Others touch us deeply, although they seem never to have really been ours. Even more disturbing, images that have been completely forgotten sometimes surface without any real explanation. The mechanisms of memory are baffling. Like a stormy sea, it is in perpetual motion, subject to waves of distortion. Over time, the precise contours of events fade, details evaporate. Like a conjurer, the brain juggles with images of the past as we revisit them, creating new certainties within us that are sometimes far removed from reality. And then there’s Proust’s madeleine. A simple smell, taste or sound opens doors to a world we thought we’d forgotten. What mysterious power lies in that instant when a sensory stimulus brings back sunken memories?

Fuubuutsushi-Engramm is an immersive, multidimensional experience that takes participants on a strange, sometimes disturbing sensory journey through memories and perceptions. While swaying, people listen through headphones to a hypnotizing voice guiding them through an exploration of what could be their own memories. The repetitive, reassuring rocking motion transports them into a melancholy, nostalgic state, while the misty ambience adds mystery and distortion to the experience, reflecting the elusive, sometimes hazy nature of memories.

Fuubuutsushi-Engrammexplores the gaps in our memory over time, inviting us to plunge into a deep reflection on the traps set by our own brains. By encouraging viewers to navigate the meanders of their memories, the work offers a poetic and reflective experience of how we interpret and preserve our personal history.

A first version of this audio-pendular creation was presented for Actoral Ottawa 2022, following exploratory work at La Serre – Arts Vivants in spring 2022. From this first draft emerged the dramaturgical foundations of the project (the monological form, the address, the processes for generating or stimulating memories) as well as the form of the installation (individual listening through headphones, the swing, the enigmatic voice).