Found in the Tank

about the art

This month we encounter three artists whose openness to the world allows them to find the stories, shapes, and sounds that the rest of us might miss. Found in the Tank pairs a music film by improviser/composer Patrick Shiroishi (saxophone) and sound artist/researcher Ivana Dama (synthesizers) with mail art featuring one of visual artist Cecile Bouchier’s Boxes. 

One windy day, Patrick and Ivana hiked through dry brush on the compound where Cecile lives and works. They pushed themselves and their instruments through a small, porthole-like opening in an abandoned oil tank to improvise with each other and the echoing, clanging, singing tank itself. 

Near the oil tank is Cecile’s studio, where she uses found materials such as yellowed pages from old books, branches, and dead birds to create dioramas that “let all these foundlings shine for one more long-lasting time.” Her piece, Sounds from a forsaken tank, includes a barn owl, whom Cecile imagines heard Patrick and Ivana’s performance in the tank near his perch.