‘Uit zicht raken’ is a 25-minute sound walk in Wilhelminapark, Breda. A site-specific work in public space, available for ten years commissioned by Witte Rook (art platform). The Dutch title ‘uit zicht raken’ is untranslatable, it points in three directions: to disappear from sight / the view itself / touching the view, the moment your body dissolves into the landscape. The closest English equivalent might be ‘losing sight’, though that captures only one of its directions.

About

What happens when a landscape begins to speak? When the park you pass daily reveals itself through multiple voices, human and non-human, historical and contemporary? The sound walk ‘uit zicht raken’ (‘losing sight’), developed by Dorien de Wit explores how language and sound can transform the physical experience of a place.For this work, Dorien de Wit immersed herself in the park. She walked, observed and listened – not only with her ears, but with her whole body. She worked with listening exercises by Pauline Oliveros (deep listening), researched old maps, letters and notes in the city archive, spoke with a landscape architect, an urban ecologist and local residents, and studied non-human life forms inhabiting the park.She discovered how the park is not only a physical space, but a collection of stories, perspectives and experiences. “On paper, the park is an objective space, but in reality it is fluid, an accumulation of stories and perspectives. I am interested in how landscape and body relate to each other. How moving, looking and thinking influence one another.”

In this audio walk, the walker’s body is activated as a sensor for perception, movement and sound. The audio is carried by a narrative built from a combination of fiction and research: conversations and walks with residents and stakeholders, observation of and inquiry into non-human life forms, weaving through the physical environment so that moments of synchronicity and friction alternate. The park unfolds as a layered space, in which both human and non-human elements are given a voice. In this way the work plays with an awareness of time, scale and perspective. The audio walk invites a rereading of this landscape and encourages a multilayered experience of Wilhelminapark.