"Once Upon Whale Song": Art, sound installation opens at Ocean Alliance

Aug. 10—Northwest artist Perri Lynch-Howard reimagines the depths of the world's oceans' as grand canyons of chorales, the habitats of whale choirs, singing — much the way Eastern Point summer resident, the late, great poet T.S. Eliot said the mermaids did — "each to each."

But chances are that like Odysseus before him, what the young Eliot heard on long summer nights on the sea were whales. Whales "singing each to each," right out there just beyond Gloucester Harbor.

If you've never heard these "sirens" of the seas, you're in for one singular sensation — actually countless sensations — at Ocean Alliance's Aug. 11th opening of its collaborative installation with Lynch-Howard: "Once Upon a Whale Song." An artist who describes herself as having a "driving curiosity to seek a deeper sense of place," Lynch-Howard's ambitious immersive art and sound installation is for locals — and visitors — who've watched Gloucester become a world center for whale research due to Ocean Alliance's work and progress. The installation will remain open through Sept. 7, which also gives visitors from out of town plenty of time to experience it and Ocean Alliance's headquarters in the iconic Tarr & Wonson Paint Manufactory on the harbor, a revelation in and of itself.

Working from audio archives at Ocean Alliance, Lynch-Howard has curated a collection of hydrophone whale recordings by Ocean Alliance founder Dr. Roger Payne, who in 1967 switched the focus of his ecological sonic research from bats and owls to whales. Payne began recording whales "singing" to each other, and became inventive at doing it.

His work resulted in ground breaking discoveries in whale research — and, in the same year, the creation of Ocean Alliance. It also succeeded in capturing the imaginations of countless humans who in the 1970s heard in his recordings a battle cry that helped inspire the "Save the Whales" movement which resulted in 1982's global moratorium on commercial whaling.

Now 97 and president of Ocean Alliance, Payne has through the years collaborated with musicians on mixing whale songs with contemporary music. His works have been sound-engineered into tracks used in recordings by Kate Bush and Judy Collins, and been used in film and TV documentary scores.

As an environmental and ecological artist, Lynch-Howard was well aware of Dr. Payne, Ocean Alliance and its work. A native of Marblehead and longtime resident of Washington state, the sea is for her almost as natural a habitat as it for whales.

Described as "an artist who "forges new narratives from the front lines of climate change," Lynch-Howard is known for the "charting or mapping of sites and situations through painting, drawing, sculpture and sound." But whale songs are a new medium.

Over a year in the making, Lynch-Howard's Ocean Alliance installation is a deeply sensory experience. Beginning in Ocean Alliance's library, where its collection of reel-to-reels are archived, the visitor then enters the gallery where the artist's sound works echo through the space via a 4-channel speaker system, while the visitor is immersed in hanging textile scrolls, each printed with spectrogram imagery that visualize the recordings. (Put simply, spectrograms are visual representations of sounds that are extensively used in multiple fields, from music to radar.)

Her installation, "Once Upon a Whale Song," describes itself as building "on the existing efforts of Ocean Alliance to protect whales and their ocean environment through research, scientific collaboration, public education, and the arts. The exhibition harnesses the power of art to weave a story that connects underwater habitats, human impacts, and the adaptive responses of whales, to inspire advocacy for the protection of oceans, worldwide."

Lynch-Howard says that she, like Payne, is inspired by "our inner navigation — the patterns, methods, and sequencing we bring to our experience."

With a BA from The Evergreen State College, a BFA from the University of Washington, and an MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art, Lynch-Howard has completed artworks on location in Covas Do Rio, Portugal, the Mamori Region of Amazonia, Civita Di Bagnoregio, Italy, and in South India as a Fulbright Scholar.

Payne's tapes, described as "unmatched in scientific existence" hold valuable clues to changes in the marine environment and soundscape, and can be used to compare to the status of the ocean today. and they used as art, building bridges of understanding and new pathways for positive change.

One interesting fact that has emerged through Payne's recordings is that whale singing is strictly a male occupation. They have a language and vocabulary that's orchestrated to communicate with each other at great depth and vast distances. Female whales, on the other hand, are scientifically said to make sounds that cannot be called singing.

Wonder what the mermaids would have to say about that?

Joann MacKenzie may be contacted at 978-675-2708, or jomackenzie@gloucestertimes.com.