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Sarah Rose, Susannah Stark, Hanna Tuulikki – Lilt, Twang, Tremor

CCA, Glasgow until January 14th 2018
Four stars

The female voice is at the centre of this exhibition by three artists who go beyond words to construct a series of town and country landscapes. These veer between communal chorales, silent environments and public proclamations. The sounds of Hanna Tuulikki's cloud-cuckoo-island (2016) and Away with the Birds (2014) overlap in a way that leaves space enough for both to breathe. Filmed on Eigg, the former finds Tuulikki taking on the mantle of Irish king, 'Mad Sweeney', whose call of the wild communes with a real life cuckoo. Away with the Birds is a group vocal composition heard on headphones that evokes a poetic impression of flight in formation.

Susannah Stark's Agora of Cynics (2017) is a series of Greek style foam columns which house a stage for public discourse. This comes through Searchlights (2017), a sound-work produced with musician Donald Hayden, which sets Berlin Wall graffiti and words from a World War Two internment camp to reggae. On a flat-screen TV, suburban idylls are overlaid with porn iconography in the animated collage of Unnatural Wealth (2017).

Four pieces by Sarah Rose offer up sculptural critiques of existing structures. In Rumours (2017), images of birds are cut out and given a fresh dimension. Elsewhere, bedding and blankets hang down. Cushions on the wall look like they're waiting to eavesdrop on someone. Oscar Marzaroli's groovy 1980 documentary on Glasgow's rebuilding is shown on a loop. Finally, SING SIGN (2015) sees Tuulikki and fellow composer Daniel Padden square up to each other with vocal exchanges that incorporate British Sign Language into the mix. While the expansive nature of all three artists sees them creating worlds to call their own, trouble in paradise remains even as voices are reclaimed.

The List, December 2017

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