Client: Whitney Museum of American Art Biennial 2008\n\nwhen you enter from the main hall of the Armory\'s second floor, you pass through a\nheavy black curtain and then step into the tent. six cots with blue wool blankets are in a row to\nthe left and quiet music of warm tones from the right. the light is dim and the fabric covering the\nhand lashed bamboo frame is made of sqares like a quilt. there is gental back lighting. a triage\ntent for peace. you can lie down and sleep to the sleeping pill music or choose to pass through.\n\nwhen you come out the far end of the tent, you are under the mezzanine\nand looking out over the drill hall through the open french doors. you still don\'t see the moose\nheads. faint cool light from the drill hall rakes in through the open doors and cuts across the tent.\nthe only other light is from the small bulb on a sewing machine. the sewing machine is an old\ngreen industrial model built into a table. behind the sewing machine is a huge quilt made of the\nsame sized squares as the tent, 20\"\'s. the center 5 squares make a red cross but are sewn on so\nit appears the cross is falling apart. sloppy. on the opposite wall is a dark staircase with a sign\nwritten in a bold child like hand, MOOSE LEVEL.\n\nhung in the stairwell, is a stained and beat up camping lantern with thick old glass, very\ndimly lit. upstairs is a dark room with a kind of bamboo fence, three old lanterns with red light\nmaking circles on the low ceiling. under the lanterns three speakers play snatches of\nconversation and street noise like passing car sound systems on a brooklyn st. all the cables for\nthe sound and lanterns are fanned out and then converge to wrap around a long bamboo prop for\nthe fence like a tail. taken all together its like an urban war bug warning us in some way we can\'t\ncomprehend.\n\npast the dragonfly fence structure, in the dark, is an open door to a small room with a\nlong industrial bench down one side and a row of battered steel lockers across the back wall. a\nguitar hangs upright from a locker door. a phonograph turntable with a hawk feather mounted to\nthe platter sticking up and out at a 45 degree angle, rotates and strums the guitar very lightly. the\nguitar is electric and plays low through an old scuffed fender reverb amp. the reverb is up.\narpeggiator is off. treble down, bass up. the guitar is open tuned, down and away from a western\nopen tuning... more like west african. this guitar playing turntable device is used a few times on\nthe \"sleeping pill\" soundtrack being played in the tent. a single bare light bulb is hidden in the\nbottom of the locker next to the guitar so that only a sliver of light spikes out from the bottom of\nthe locker, casting the shadow of the rotating feather in a dance back and forth along the\nopposite wall from the bench. its the only light in the room. scrap bamboo is piled behind the\nbench. in a dark corner, a ragged white flag (7\" x 11\") from the same cloth as the tent is fitted\naround a 5\' length of 3/4\'\' inch bamboo.\n\ncoming out of the guitar room it is very dark. a small video on the wall through another\ndoor draws you onto the balcony. the video is of a humming bird suspended in flight and is\nprojected so small the humming bird is almost life size. the projection is about 1\' off the floor.\nthere is an intense yet quiet sound of humming coming from the heap of cables, projector and\nsmall 4\" wooden speakers stacked in a pile in front of the humming bird projection. the humming\nsound feels like its a bird but its from an old arp 2600 analog synth which was used extensively\non the sleeping pill sound track inside the tent. as your eyes adjust to the dark you realize you\'re\non the balcony overlooking the tent. after a while your eyes adjust further and you start to make\nout the moose heads mounted at eye-level around the walls looking down onto the tent with\nsleeping people inside.
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