Bird Radio and the Eames Chair Lounge (2007), is a multi-faceted artwork by Regina-born artist Bill Burns which asks us to consider what a true experience of nature really is. It is installed in the MacKenzie Art Gallery’s café, Craft Services, and opened in January 2019. Bird Radio is a multimedia installation made up of a chandelier-like assemblage of radio and transmitting devices which play and broadcast birdcalls on FM radio, surrounded by a selection of modern Eames chairs, designed by Ray and Charles Eames in the mid-20th century.
The radio assemblage is made up of new and rebuilt versions of pre-existing devices which reproduce the calls of birds that have been exiled from our urban environments. Viewers may gently manipulate these items to produce bird calls. The bird calls may be broadcast via the nearby radio antenna, also hanging from the café ceiling, to the cluster of radios above the bar or any other FM receiver. This sound element of this piece may be activated during select times throughout the year.
Bill Burns is an artist and the artistic director of the Dogs and Boats and Airplanes Children’s Choir in Toronto. His works are included in collections around the world including the Museum of Modern Art Special Library Collection, New York; Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein, Vaduz; Tate Britain – Artists’ Books Collection; The Getty Center, Los Angeles; the MacKenzie Art Gallery, Regina; Remai Modern, Saskatoon; and the Cabinet des estampes, Geneva.
He has published numerous books and essays including When Pain Strikes, a scholarly anthology (Burns, Busby and Sawchuk, editors and contributors, University of Minnesota Press, 1999: Minneapolis), Bird Radio (Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther Koenig and KW Institute for Contemporary Art, 2007: Cologne and Berlin), The Guide to the Flora and Fauna Information Service:0.800.0FAUNA0FLORA (Institute of Contemporary Arts, 2008: London, England) and Two Boiler Suits and a Playlist (YYZ BOOKS, 2010: Toronto). A boxed edition of three of his books about plants and animals and war was published by Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther Koenig (2011: Cologne). Hans Ulrich Obrist Hear Us, a memoir about Bill’s life as an artist, is published by Black Dog Publishing and YYZ BOOKS (2015: London and Toronto).
Bill Burns was born in Regina, Saskatchewan, lives in Toronto, and has an MA from Goldsmiths’ College in London, England.
Photos: Courtesy MacKenzie Art Gallery and the artist.
