One Week of Lullabies for Roux

Copied Christine Sun Kim, One Week of Lullabies for Roux, 2018, seven tracks, sound, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment, 2020.79.1, © 2018 Christine Sun Kim. Courtesy of the artist and François Ghebaly, Los Angeles

Artwork Details

Title
One Week of Lullabies for Roux
Date
2018
Location
Not on view
Copyright
© 2018 Christine Sun Kim. Courtesy of the artist and François Ghebaly, Los Angeles
Credit Line
Museum purchase through the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment
Mediums Description
seven tracks, sound
Classifications
Keywords
  • Performing arts — music — voice
Object Number
2020.79.1

Artwork Description

Through her art, Kim encourages audiences to attend to the links between music and meaning, sound and other senses, perception and interpretation, and various modes of communication. She uses scores, graphical notation and text, and performance and media installations to explore how she and the larger Deaf community establish their own relationships to the world of sound.

Kim wrote a text score for One Week of Lullabies for Roux, guiding seven friends (who were also parents) as they composed original soothing soundtracks for coaxing her own newborn, Roux, to sleep. Kim's instructions called for lullabies without lyrics that emphasized low frequencies, so she would be able to monitor and feel comfortable about the audio she was introducing into her baby's "sound diet." The artist-designed bench evokes a color-coded weekly pillbox, suggesting these songs are daily medicine.

Musical Thinking: New Video Art and Sonic Strategies, 2023

Related Books

The cover of the publication Musical Thinking New Video Art & Sonic Strategies
Musical Thinking: New Video Art and Sonic Strategies 
Exploring the powerful resonances between recent video art and popular music, the exhibition Musical Thinking: New Video Art and Sonic Strategies features ten leading contemporary artists and the work.

Exhibitions

Media - 2020.54.1 - SAAM-2020.54.1_2 - 139600
Musical Thinking: New Video Art and Sonic Strategies
June 23, 2023January 28, 2024
Musical Thinking explores the powerful resonances between recent video art and popular music.

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