Carmen Molenaar

Listening to the many songs and sounds with which the land moves, Carmen Molenaar searches for a way that we might sing back. In Sound of Sediment, the mountains and rivers stand at the centre of the work as both entities and multitudes, moving the earth and its waters, shaping the surrounding environment and life. As the work is grounded in the floodplains of the Rhine, the river facilitates in both geological and lyrical means as a carrier from and to the mountains. 

In these times of planetary change, Carmen feels the necessity to search for a way in which human life can communicate with the land and its non-human inhabitants, in a way that surpasses our differences in language. From a curious attitude, through careful and appreciative methodologies, Carmen dives into the character of the land. 

By exploring the qualities of several of the Rhine’s sedimentary deposits, unearthing and processing clay, she uses this mountainous material to create a range of instruments. Their shapes and sounds express and reflect elements from the floodplains, forming both a physical and audible translation of the land. By playing these instruments for and with both human and non-human entities, they create moments of communion and reciprocity, using the sound and the river as channels of sharing.

This page was last updated on June 15, 2023