Polyphonies

Polyphonies brings together a group of artists who challenge the intrinsic hierarchies and biases of language.

Translation, creolisation and colonisation have long been powerful and transformative actors across all languages. These events have often led to the creation of hybrid vernaculars that are enriched and diminished in their own particular ways –sometimes resulting in the corollary erosion or complete erasure of other tongues.

The Greek word poliphōnia translates literally to ‘many sounds’, and in music, polyphony is given to mean two or more independent melodies played simultaneously. The group exhibition Polyphonies presents an array of voices who challenge dominant languages by calling forth alternative historical or non-verbal discourses. Although these narratives ‘play simultaneously’, they are frequently silenced by louder ones.

This presentation understands that language is the vessel for knowledge, history and communication, and that these are contrarily to be found in abundance outside of the written word. The exhibition includes works by several international artists who highlight the immense profundity and potential of different kinds of language, including those which rely on visual and oral articulation alone; those embodied entirely in nature, space or song, and verbal systems peppered so thickly with lacunae that much of their meaning remains beyond the page. The works presented here serve as a reminder of the complementary power of these systems, and make a case for the boundless epistemological possibilities to be found in polyphony.