Newsha Tavakolian
Untitled from the series Blank Pages of an Iranian Photo Album
2014-2015
Text
Mehran MohajerThe Mute Loudspeaker
A solitary loudspeaker stands alone, with no one behind it, in a dim, smoky,
and murky space. Even the smoke seems unable to bear the weight of darkness—it
longs to escape the frame of the picture, if such an
escape exists. In this obscurity, there is no color, only the shades of leaden
gray. This leaden gray reminds me of lead typefaces—now obsolete—that once gave
language a written form. The loudspeaker, on the other hand, called words into
speech.
Here, in the gleam of the loudspeaker, in the dark void of the background,
and within the hazy smoke, I search for some trace or sign of words. Is there a
trace? There is not. But silence—yes, silence is present. There is no one to
speak the words. No voice. No speaker. No listener. And the words? They are
absent too. Have they melted into air? Or have they been buried in this earth? What
does the photograph speak of in this suspension?
It seems to see speech as impossible.