Artist Project: Andrea Hornick: Unbounded Histories

Unbounded Histories is a sound intervention in the Barnes Collection Gallery. This site-specific piece by Philadelphia artist Andrea Hornick can be streamed on any web-enabled phone as you explore the collection.

Hornick’s piece comprises a string of poems responding to specific works in the Barnes collection. The poems subvert the logic of traditional audiotours by offering unexpected narratives and dream-like imagery. Hornick worked for months directly in the collection, putting herself in a trance-like state in order to access the depths of her own psyche, letting the works of art lead her toward stories and images that the mind normally keeps buried. The narratives—deeply personal, and often with a feminist edge—emerged from these sessions.

The resulting juxtaposition of sound and sight encourages us to consider works in the Barnes collection in a new way—as portals to the unconscious.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website