Sound Installation
31 August - 25 September, 2011
Investigating the manipulation rather than the creation of sound, Dawn Scarfe engages the viewer in the creative act of listening. Using a simple methodology Scarfe selects and experiments with noise from our everyday environment, from glasses to traffic to murmurs, extending their definitions as sound to give them a performative quality.
Drifting through the foyer of the Poetry Library, Scarfe subjects W.H. Auden’s reading of his poem In Memory of W.B.Yeats to a gradual metamorphosis, from spoken word to a musical sound of a tenor viol. Picking out the line "the words of a dead man are modified in the guts of the living", Scarfe links the poem to the instrument, which uses animal gut for its strings. Auden’s reading is repetitively re-sounded through the viol, gradually drowning out the poet’s voice.
Focusing on the physicality of the spoken word Scarfe’s work suggests how poetry often resonates more in its reading than in written form with the sound as a technologically generated physical presence and a revival of Auden’s voice into the contemporary surroundings of the Southbank Centre.
Dawn Scarfe has recently completed a PhD in Composition from Goldsmiths University. She has exhibited across London in spaces such as Whitechapel Gallery, James Taylor Gallery and SPACE as well as in Bios in Athens, La Casa Encendida in Madrid and Museums Quartier in Vienna.
With thanks to the Viola da Gamba Society and Bridgewood & Neitzert
Prompted by the Festival of Britain celebrations, Art on Poetry is a dedicated season of artists' books at the Saison Poetry Library. Twelve internationally acclaimed artists are given a rare opportunity to draw upon Southbank Centre's archives and re-consider British identity sixty years on.
The Saison Poetry Library is situated on the fifth level of the Royal Festival Hall and open from Tuesday to Sunday, 11am - 8pm. 
| Antonio Claudio Carvalho | 20th April - 22th May |
| Hellicar and Lewis | 20th April - 29th May |
| Meghana Bisineer | 1st June - 3rd July |
| Godfried Donkor | 1st June - 3rd July |
| Alexandre Bettler | 6th July - 31st July |
| Alex Czinczel | 6th July - 31st July |
| Oona Grimes | 6th July - 31st July |
| GOTOTEN | 3rd - 28th August |
| Katherine Jones | 3rd - 28th August |
| Alex Knell | 31st August - 25th September |
| Dawn Scarfe | 31st August - 25th September |
| Martin Sexton | 31st August - 25th September |
Open: Tuesday to Sunday, 11am - 8pm.
Saison Poetry Library
Level 5
Royal Festival Hall
London SE1 8XX
Phone: 020 7921 0943 / 020 7921 0664
Underground stations: Waterloo & Embankment
Railway stations: Waterloo, Waterloo East & Charing Cross
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it | www.poetrylibrary.org.uk | http://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/
