Take an Island Vacation in NYC: Hop the Ferry to Staten Island for Matthea Harvey and Justin Bennett's "stillspotting nyc: staten island" Installation

Many times in years past we've sought respite from New York City's steamy summer heat by hopping the ferry to Staten Island.  The trip takes roughly 25 minutes, there's a breeze off the water, a stunning view of lower Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty, and, it's free!

Now there's added incentive to head to the ferry's Whitehall terminal: Telettrofono, a fascinating collaboration between award winning poet Matthea Harvey and sound artist Justin Bennett, is live on Staten Island.  Visitors to Telettrofono will be guided to points along the SI waterfront while listening to a 90-minute tale about the real — and not so real — life of inventor Antonio Meucci.  Here's how Matthea Harvey describes the project:

This year I worked on making a soundwalk with amazing sound artist Justin Bennett for the Guggenheim architecture program--it's going on for four weekends (starting this weekend) in Staten Island.. . The piece is called Telettrofono and it's about Antonio Meucci (who invented the telephone decades before Bell) and his mermaid wife, Esterre. Meucci was an amazing nineteenth century inventor who made a marine telephone for divers to speak with ship captains, flame-retardant paint (which he advised using on your underwear) and improved effervescent drinks, among other things. The Telettrofono tour will introduce you to his real and imagined inventions, a mermaid chorus, a preset verifiable fact mode, and the story of a mermaid who leaves the water because of her love of how things sound aboveground.

Matthea shared an excerpt from the audio program:

Preset Fairytale Mode:

Once upon a time in the time

of once upon a time, there was

an inventor who loved a mermaid

and would do anything to please her.

Because she loved sound, he invented

a megaphone, a telettrofono and a drink

that fizzed with the tiny effervescent

fireworks of fermented fruit. Because

she loved light, he invented smokeless

wicks and built a candle factory. Because

she was over-fond of candles, he invented

flame retardant paint. Because she loved

her cats, he came up with a way to carefully

quantify the amount of cream in their milk.

Because she missed her sisters’ voices

he made a marine telephone. Because

her bones were not made for this loud

human world, they began to crack and

ache and crumble. Because she needed quiet

he tried to hush the trains, the carriage,

even the gulls. Because she could no longer

climb up or down the stairs, he carried her.

--

Isn't it dreamy? 

Telettrofono is part of the Guggenheim Museum's two-year multidisciplinary plan to take the museum’s Architecture and Urban Studies programming out into the streets.  You can visit on Saturdays and Sundays, July 21–22, 28–29, and August 4–5, from 12 pm–7 pm.  For more information, go here.

-- sdh