Les Siffleuses
recovered engine, metal, petg, wood, junction box, cable
Les Siffleuses (French for The Whistlers) is a sound installation in which beer bottles, suspended along metal bars, emit the familiar noise produced when one blows across the neck of an empty or half-full bottle. A hydraulic system fi lls the bottles from below, altering their pitch. The beers whistle, communicate, and play together like a chorus of singing birds. This familiar, innocent sound of a post-evening, post-event, post-work moment is here artifi cially and ritualistically recreated. Technically, each bottle is fi tted with a pipe at its neck, allowing it to be opened and closed to produce sound. Automated syringes on the fl oor adjust the liquid level in each bottle, changing the note: a full bottle emits a higher pitch, while an empty one produces a deeper tone. Each bottle acts as an individual voice—they call out, respond, agree, or disagree. These exchanges can be understood as a form of mimicry, echoing the way birds call and wait for an answer. If no reply comes, the initiating bottle tries again. The resulting system is a web of complex, dynamic interactions. The viewer cannot immediately decipher these relationships and must wait, listen, and attempt to catch the fragments of meaning that emerge from the soundscape. Les Siffl euses form an ensemble—a group of animal-machines singing to each other. Assembled together, these objects become a kind of artifi cial fauna, inhabiting a space caught between the dystopia of overconsumption and a musical utopia. The bottles, attended by their syringes, take center stage, while the human observer becomes a passive witness to their mechanical communion. Les Siffleuses is an autonomous installation, but it can also be transformed into a musical instrument. Thanks to Sarah Wéry’s mastery of the bottles, the installation becomes a kind of organ. The beers, which once communicated independently and formed positive or negative relationships, now set aside their egos to perform a collective symphony. Far from being a conventional instrument, Sarah Wéry—musician and composer—embraces the imperfections of the installation. The result is a series of surprising, unexpected sounds emerging from otherwise familiar objects.
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