Q&A: Cadine Navarro on Seed Songs for a New Earth

On an atomic level, everything is in motion and thus has sound. This is the basis to my interest in exploring “sound” as a medium in my work. I also understand sound as a powerful tool of awareness because if we realize how much of a ripple effect that even the slightest sound can have on shaping our perception, then we must pay attention!

But because sound is mostly “invisible”, we tend to ignore its importance. So, in 2014, I set out to make work with sound and ended up inventing a unique method to visualize the vibrations emanating from sound by combining highly sensitive mics and speakers with a traditional Japanese marbling technique. After years of testing out the patterns made by human voice, accents, intonations, volume, etc, I decided to work with non-human sound source to show how everything is expression, and we are all interconnected in this. I decided to work with seeds for my project in Ohio—the homeland of my mother. I chose nine native prairie seeds. It was a bold and wild idea that we could “listen to seeds”, and instantly shunned by many local scientists, however we (curator Janice Glowski and I) were able to obtain results. What we heard on the recordings were slight popping sounds, and each of the nine prairie seed species had different and unique rhythms.

I have come to understand Japan—the place where I was born and raised yet I was always considered a “gaijin” or “foreigner”—as my mentor, and the many other countries in which I have lived all contribute to my worldview. Like Voltaire’s story of Candide, what you come to understand after traveling to so many lands, is “to cultivate your own garden”—to see the whole world as a reflection of self. The seeds teach this to me too. My goal as an artist is to offer this message of kin and connection through my work. We do not have to seek outside of ourselves for answers or inspiration, and any bit of healing or understanding of self offers the possibility of a greater connection to the whole. Our bodies are a reflection of our landscapes- if we look at traditional Chinese medicine maps, the body is the land, so healing a pain or discomfort within has a very real effect without. This is honestly what I return to again and again the more I travel and experience different cultures. This realization feels so powerful for living more harmoniously with our planet, and that is why I am interested in sharing this experience in my art. 

The first installation of It Sounds Like Love at the Frank Museum at Otterbein University—a repurposed church—proved to be a transformative experience as we held over 40 immersive events that included everything from meditation to ritual. This was a dark and peaceful space, and the only light came from the seed patterns in the floor. The space in the Grange Insurance Audubon Center was surrounded by windows and daylight and incorporated the sounds of the surrounding birds and wind picked up by outdoor mics. And now the film in The Box takes the viewer much more quickly into the process and rhythm of the work. Each iteration brings new breath to this project and asks us to enter into dialogue and relationship with the seeds of life. 

I see this work as an emergent language that is pattern-based and includes the “voices” and sounds of the more-than-human. In order for this type of language to exist, it must interweave science, creativity, and spirit—a delicate and necessary dance of logic, imagination, and magic. For me, this is a process of opening to the world, and I aim to share this new form of communication through my art. 

Collaboration is key to ongoing learning, and that is why I wanted to create visuals that were abstract enough for anyone to relate to them and also specific enough for visitors to have a personal experience. The work lives and breathes through the people that come to experience it and I value their insights and trainings. So far we have had collaborations with soil scientists, entomologists, yogic practitioners, chefs, musicians, kids, poets… I could go on. And now we are doing some groundbreaking research around seeds in the acoustics lab at MIT. The professor I am working with there has thanked me for this project, which has opened up unexpected questions and new research.