Alimentació is a collaborative performance-based sound installation created by more than 20 artists under the direction of Barbara Held, as the final project of the Sound Installation course of the Master in Sound Art, University of Barcelona. Conceived as a site-specific exploration of concepts of feedback (electronic and analog), a sonic mirror relating inside/outside (as in sound’s “spatial transgression, this mingling between inside and outside…[creating] a sense of immediacy…sound propagates to leave behind the original object or body.” “Sound unfolds as a dynamic relation between an inside and an outside – it forces the two together.”1

The visually transparent glassed-in booth in the Sala Ricson creates an aural partition or boundary. Sounds are performed live in the brightly-lit booth, and sent 2 to a series of digital and analogue performers in the large, dark main space, where they are re-alimented and transformed. The sound performances are related to the celebration of art world rituals such as the opening of an exhibition. The ritual is a way in which we relate to our surroundings. There is an element of voyeuristic pleasure in the mis en scene.

The process took place over the space of 3 days, with a live invited audience at the project’s “closing”.