February 16, 2003
Mills Gallery is alive with the ambitious sounds of 'Boom Box'
But gadgetry overshadows sophistication

By Cate McQuaid
Globe Correspondent

Sound can be a mighty thing in art. If not used wisely, it can drown out the visual part of the art experience. With the advantages of new technology, sound art has moved forward in recent years. Roland Smart, the bright young curator who oversaw the late, lamented Gallery Bershad, has orchestrated ''Boom Box,'' which examines the crossover between aural and visual art, in the Mills Gallery at the Boston Center for the Arts.
Loosely defined, ''sound art'' covers music and ambience, pirate-radio broadcasts, digital translations of light and motion into something aural, surround sound, and spoken word. In short, it's anything that makes a noise. Work like this by 16 artists results in a bit of a cacophony at the Mills, but not an overpowering one. You can still experience each piece of art discretely.
John Cage, who created sound-based performance art in the last half of the 20th century, can be seen as the progenitor of this kind of work. Cage's sounds, and his silences, invited his audience to listen to themselves as much as to him. That engagement with the audience marks many of the works in ''Boom Box.'' Many are interactive. Some interact with you whether you like it or not.
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Ravi Jain is a performance artist - one who reaches into the community with his work and lets it ripple out into everyday life. His ''Concerto for Voicemail No. 1'' is here on video, which you can listen to through a phone receiver. Jain's home voice mail recording was ''Hi, this is Ravi. Leave a message or accompany this bass line.'' Then he played a riff. Folks would call in and leave melodious messages for him, turning telephone communication into musical collaboration. We witness Jain's cleverness but miss engaging with it, only seeing the video of him playing along with his messages. Maybe you have to call him directly to get in on the fun.
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Smart is on the edge of something worthwhile with ''Boom Box.'' He's right to put together a show about sound art, since it's changing so quickly and integrating into society in new ways. But there's too much whiz-bang and not enough reflection and depth here - which suggests Smart should wait five years and do it again.

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