‘Cerca del cielo no se vive bien. Historias del éter’, presented by Xabier Erkizia, is another programme which consonni presents. It is a radio programme about the radio, and a proposal which reviews, through several characters of the twentieth century, not only the forms this medium has evolved into since its beginnings, but also the forms it could have turned into. It is also a forensic analysis of a means of communication which, in addition to proposing a new world model, has radically changed the way of understanding the body. In conclusion, a series of stories of the ether, written from the site.
Xabier Erkizia (Lesaka, 1975) is a sound artist, producer and curator. All his works are based on phenomenology in the context of sound and listening, and are developed through formal, aesthetic or political research, paying special attention to the geographical condition. He works or has worked as a co-director of the ERTZ (1999-2018) event and as sound department coordinator of the Arteleku Centre (2002-2014). He is the founder of the sound archive of the Basque Country soinumapa.net and is currently a member of the AUDIOLAB association. During the last few years he has been working as an invited professor in various schools and universities.
#04 Listening to war can cause deafness Armand Robin (1912-1961)
The innumerable sound conflicts which occurred during World War II are largely to blame for our contemporary ways of listening. Loudspeakers, radios, sonic cannons or sonic strategies used to generate fear, are part of our so-called peaceful day-to-day, although they were originally powerful sonic weapons capable of questioning the world. A war needs hearers and listeners, hunters and prey, but it also needs sentries capable of understanding the horror hidden behind the walls of noise. Armand Robin, a poet, essayist and translator, but above all an expert in false words, was one of them.
