Rescue Silence 02 "guarding one square inch of silence, listening to the quiet movement in Kaohsiung in Weiwu Camp."

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Wen/Wang Nanqi (writer)/Tu Jianfeng

Do I have to use a microphone to make a speech? Wu Ma, director of Kaohsiung Normal University's Interdisciplinary Art Institute, hit my heart with the first sentence of the lecture "Saving Silence ~ Listening to the Sound and Landscape Pulse of Sustainable Cities":"The space at today's lecture is actually not big, and every lecturer is still used to speaking with a microphone once he takes the stage; if he is abroad, the speaker will not use a microphone in a space of similar size."

Wu Ma said softly,"Listen quietly, listen carefully, you can definitely hear it!" However, the ambient noise everywhere in Taiwan makes us have to pick up the microphone to speak, but sometimes because of the echo or ambient sound, the audience can not focus on what the speaker wants to say!"

In fact, the microphone problem is not only in the education scene, in many natural fields will also encounter the use of microphones in group guides, a large number of artificial noise not only affects the nature of biological communication and mating behavior changes, even let people who want to heal the body and mind by getting close to nature but also more anxious, lost the instinct and beauty of listening to nature.

Yang Peiyun Photography Fan Qinhui Restoration Sound Scene

As soon as the topic changed, Wu Ma began to describe the origin of her acquaintance with Fan Qinhui, the host of the lecture "Saving Silence ~ Listening to the Sound and Scene Pulse of Sustainable Cities":"In the Taipei Biennial Exhibition" Post-Nature: Art Museum as an Ecosystem "curated by me in 2018, Fan Qinhui invited Fan Qinhui to create" Near the Round Mountain: Listening to the Silence and Noise of the Keelung River "based on the work" Near the Round Mountain "by Guo Xuehu in 1928.

Fan Qinhui climbs the Jiantan Mountain Trail to find traces of Guo Xuehu's "Near the Round Mountain" written 90 years ago. However, Meiji Iron Bridge in the painting has long been a busy Zhongshan Bridge, the sound of streams is covered by the sound of traffic tide, and the leisurely silence in the painting is moving towards a noisy one in the process of modernization! The only thing he heard throughout the ages was the sound clues left behind by the wind-driven tree shaking. Therefore, Fan Qinhui tried to simulate the soundscape of Guo Xuehu's "Near the Round Mountain" created in 1928 with the sound of ecological species at the same altitude, including possible natural, geographical sound fields and seasonal feelings, as well as human activity sounds, and reshaped the reproduction of the sense of place through "sound landmarks".

Wu Ma said,"Japan has a very special profession called 'sound scene', that is, sound restorer, hear the sound to be responsible for restoring that scene back, for example, hear the sound of bamboo forest here in the past, to restore the place to the state of bamboo forest in the past."

Fan Qinhui recreates the landscape of Guo Xuehu's painting in his role as a soundscape master. People enter the museum to visit Guo Xuehu's "Near the Round Mountain." Their eyes appreciate the brilliant mineral stacks blooming in the painting. Their ears hear Fan Qinhui's simulated natural soundscape. Tradition and technology complement each other. They have a sense of history and space. The viewer also returns to Guo Xuehu's energetic young painter 90 years ago in the reconstruction of the soundscape master and sees his vision. Hear him hear him.

Guard a square inch of silence

At the end of Wu Ma's speech, he concluded with a question: "Most of today's environmental movements adopt the method of accusation. Please think about whether there are other methods." For example, tree protection movement can let you hear trees singing (ask tree protectors to collect tree information, let music genealogy play notes, etc.), when people recognize these beautiful feelings, will they try to protect the broken environment because they want to preserve these beautiful feelings?"

Wu Ma's final question was actually the same question Fan Qinhui had been asking himself for seventeen years. She went up the mountain and down the sea to collect the sounds of nature, and she found that the ecology was rapidly collapsing, and the earth was facing a series of evil consequences brought about by greed, desire, and domination that the human heart could not control. In addition to shouting on her radio show Nature Notes, Fan Qinhui has been wondering what else she can do.

When Fan saw the American sound ecologist and Emmy-winning sound engineer Gordon Hampton's book "One Square Inch of Silence," the author, in order to defend one square inch of silence in the Huo River rainforest near his home in Olympic National Park, wrote to all airlines passing through the rainforest explaining the value of silence and the noise interference caused by jet planes, asking airlines to avoid Olympic National Park. Three airlines-American Airlines, Hawaiian Airlines and Alaska Airlines-changed their routes because of Gordon's petition!

Yang Peiyun Photography Stone in Eastern Taiwan Becomes Wishing Stone, Launching Taiwan Rescue Silence Movement

A deeply moved Fan summoned the courage to write to Gordon, who asked her to send him a stone to place in "one square inch of silence," and Gordon wrote,"A stone from eastern Taiwan, originating in the Central Mountains, has quietly entered my life, but it has brought me to listen not only to the external environment, but also to my own internal voice."

The stone Fan sent Gordon was a pebble with a white circular loop, known to Native Americans as a "wishing stone." On Dec. 12, 2012, the wishing stone began its two-month, one-square-inch journey, and Gordon set it down thinking,"Nothing is impossible!" On February 19 of the following year, when he returned the wishing stone to Fan Qinhui, Gordon wrote in his letter: "Silence will come home."

Later, after the wishing stone followed Fan Qinhui around the earth for nearly one circle, it returned to Taiwan and began to rescue silence. In 2018, the world's first national-level "Silent Mountain Trail" started from Cuifeng Lake at an altitude of 1800 meters under Fan Qinhui's efforts and the planning of Luodong Forest Management Office of Forest Service Bureau.

Taiping Mountain on Lake Cuifeng was once one of Taiwan's three largest forest farms. Through the years of logging, nature all things in this recuperation, showing the colorful vitality! Because of its geographical location and the abundant rainfall brought by the northeast monsoon, the Taiping Mountain forest is covered with thick moss, making it an excellent sound-absorbing foam, creating a natural sound listening room, making it the quietest place in Taiwan!

However, the beautiful melody, but also with a quiet heart, in order to carefully understand. Visitors to this Silent Mountain Trail will understand that maintaining a quiet attitude is important for forest conservation and will be willing to respect this silence. Through "listening" to feel the "sound landscape", get full of energy healing and moving.