‘Cupboard 55 is a sonic arts project which took place as a multimedia installation in May 2000 at Middlesex University.
In this installation we have attempted to ”synthesise” a sound and visual ”representation” of contrasting elements taken from such diverse sources as a rather hilarious sexual fantasy story found on the internet, ”natural” sounds from a trip to Australia (exotic bird calls and the sound of the Coral Sea), Lewis Carrol”s ”Alice in Wonderland” (Chapter 1), and sounds of Meditation. These sounds can be heard on four telephones, one of which requires the audience”s participation.
The ”natural” and meditation sounds are effected, via light sensors, by the projected image, taken from an ”explicit” film. Ultimately, we hope to have presented the idea of sex and sexuality as just one aspect, albeit a fundamental though often misrepresented one, of human nature.
This project began as an exploration of the phenomenal changes in attitude towards sexuality experienced over the course of history, and how the morality of the Victorian era has heavily prejudiced our ”modern” opinions. The most obvious example of this was the discovery of the incinerated ruins of Pompeii. Initial delight at the uncovering of the ancient site soon turned sour as Victorian archeologists unearthed increasingly sexually explicit artefacts. Unable to disregard the archeological significance of the find, the Victorian scholars were nevertheless, appalled at their discoveries and felt duty-bound to conceal their content from the more ”impressionable” elements of society; they being women, children and the lower classes.
Consequently, they hid the offending artefacts “in a locked room at the Museo Borbonico, (by then transformed into the National Museum of Naples)”. The actual place within the museum where these ”licentious” objects are still kept is known as ”cupboard 55”, which we considered a suitable, perversely unassuming, title for our installation.
marie-josiane agossou and mark horrocks
references:\Kendrick, W. (1987) <em>The Secret Museum, Pornography in Modern Culture Viking ‘CUPBOARD 55 – an installation’