Sonic Blanket expands its reach beyond radio waves in Brattleboro

Sep. 9—BRATTLEBORO — While not visible to the naked eye, a quilt interwoven with the voices of community members hovers above the greater Brattleboro area.

Known as the Sonic Blanket, the multimedia art project is being created by and for those living in Brattleboro. At its core is a 15-minute radio piece that premiered on the first full moon of December 2021 and is now re-broadcast every night at midnight and on Sundays at 2:30 p.m. on Brattleboro Community Radio (WVEW).

The project has since expanded beyond the airwaves over the town with public art installations and art-making workshops. Starting Sunday, a banner with the statement, "You are beneath the cover of the Sonic Blanket," will hang over Main Street until the following Sunday, Sept. 18.

Sonic Blanket began in the mind of Keene State College art and design professor Jonathan Gitelson. During the early days of the pandemic, Gitelson was walking around Brattleboro, where he has lived for the past 17 years.

"It just felt so quiet and eerie, with all the lights on in those houses. I really wanted to answer the question of, 'How do I make something to address this experience?' " he said.

Gitelson, who had been a disc jockey on WVEW for a few years, started with the concept of a radio project.

"What I always have loved about the radio was the fact that there are physical radio waves ... So I'm just starting to imagine radio waves as a forcefield or a blanket that hovers over the town."

This blanket was something Gitelson found could connect the community of Brattleboro during a time of isolation. He was also interested in the possibility of collaboration.

Diana Whitney, a fellow Brattleboro-based artist Gitelson has known for a number of years, was the first person he reached out to when looking for collaborators. Gitelson was then introduced to Weston Olencki — a musician, composer and sound artist — through Jamie Mohre, director of Epsilon Spires. Olencki's work as an artist is focused on field recordings, according to Gitelson. These are sound recordings of everyday objects outside of a controlled studio environment, which get manipulated in the editing process, such as by changing their pitch or playback speed.

From there, the team of three collaborated primarily through online communication due to the pandemic to devise the project and how to present it.

"We met on Zoom and created a Google Drive to share ideas and inspiration," Gitelson said. "Diana dropped in some readings and poems, Weston put in some music ... Slowly we started coming together with the idea that we wanted to combine poetry and sound."

The pattern for the Sonic Blanket had been created. From there, it was time to start stitching together pieces of the project's "fabric."

The field recordings were all done in the geographic area that falls under the radio waves of WVEW. Gitelson drove throughout the surrounding area and created a map of how far these waves reach, which gave the blanket visual shape. Whitney wrote a poem for the project that describes the feeling of connection within a community, despite being physically apart, through sounds present in nature, and the team then put out a call for residents to be recorded reading the text. Olencki made and recorded all the field recordings, samples and audio materials.

Whitney interprets the blanket as a protective spell over the community, which, she notes, stems from her love of the fantasy book series "Harry Potter."

"The blanket — being the radio waves — also bring the sound of peace," Whitney said. "It's something nurturing. It protects and comforts during this time of grief and loss for so many."

The team decided the piece would run until the first full moon in December 2022.

"We decided on a lunar year for the broadcast rather than a calendar year because that is more connected with the land and with this idea of place, the idea of connecting with the area's Indigenous culture and history," Gitelson said.

This included collaborating with Denise and Paul Pouliot, tribal leaders of the Cowasuck Band of the Pennacook-Abenaki People in New Hampshire.

"They graciously welcomed us into their home and shared with us their collection of traditional Abenaki instruments and traditions," Gitelson said. "The recordings that we made at their home [with those instruments] are an important part of the piece."

Sonic Blanket has since received a number of grants over the course of its nearly year on the air to support more public-facing and connections-based art installations in the community.

It was one of 25 projects awarded a 2022 Creation Grant from the Vermont Art Council. This year's program was extremely competitive, according to a recent news release from the council, with a record 218 applications totaling $870,188 in requests. Recipients were selected by two independent panels composed of 38 Vermont artists and arts professionals. Grant awards are $4,000, which the artist may use for time spent developing new work, to purchase materials, or to rent equipment or space for the process, according to the release.

The Arts Council of Windham County also awarded Sonic Blanket a grant from the Brattleboro Town Arts Fund this year.

The fund promotes creative projects that contribute to the greater community of Brattleboro's arts and cultural landscape, according to a recent news release. Past grants the Sonic Blanket project has received include a Keene State College Faculty Development Grant and an Artist Development Grant from the Vermont Arts Council.

Since the initial broadcast in December of 2021, the project has expanded beyond its initial invisible seams. Sonic Blanket has had a presence at Gallery Walk on the first Friday of each month in downtown Brattleboro, with activities such as public listening sessions of the 15-minute broadcast, interactive art installations and art-making workshops.

In June, the team presented a live listening party. An FM radio was centered within dozens of pieces of fabric blowing in the wind as passersby young and old walked, ran and twirled throughout. Last week's Gallery Walk featured a bookmaking workshop where participants were encouraged to hide their books in spaces around Brattleboro they found meaningful.

"This project has been more exciting than I could have imagined, to watch how it's expanded and brought out these different components," Whitney said. "We've really been able to explore this idea of, 'What are the invisible things that connect us, and how does art connect us?' It's become a community art-making project that just keeps going."

James Rinker is the digital community engagement journalist for The Sentinel. He can be reached at jrinker@keenesentinel.com or at 355-8569. Follow him on Twitter @JamesRinkerKS