Very Local Radio: amplifying ephemeral sound communities

Listening is considered as activism where radio amplifies the sounds of ephemeral social networks.

This paper discusses a series of journeys through the cities of Melbourne and Adelaide undertaken as part of the art project Very Local Radio (Grbich/Angove, 2015). The work in question comprises a live Internet radio broadcaster, mounted on a hand-pushed trolley. Very Local Radio is performed in real-time as a mobile event moving through shifting sites of sociality (Latour, 2005), taking in artists, things, publics, places, and online radio listeners. I suggest that navigating the city in this manner is a performance of ‘excess’ where art making exceeds the capitalist logics of city spaces – not by engaging illegal actions, but by moving outside of expectations of usefulness and moving with sensuous attentiveness (Bennett, 2010). Here listening is approached as a mode of activism in shifting locales, where very local radio is used to amplify the sound of ephemeral social networks.

  • Very Local Radio, Performing Mobilities, 2015.

  • Very Local Radio, Performing Mobilities, 2015.

  • Very Local Radio, Performing Mobilities, 2015.

  • Very Local Radio, Performing Mobilities, 2015.

  • Very Local Radio, Performing Mobilities, 2015.

  • Very Local Radio, Performing Mobilities, 2015.