The Kunsthalle's terrace bar has become my favourite watering hole in Bern. A lot of interesting animals come to drink here - humans are animals, right? Unfortunately not many of them seem to have visited the Kunsthaus, but sometimes I do get talking to people who have come out, blinking in the light, and want to stick around. The other day, for example, I met a woman who said how much she loves the audio piece which she listened to while watching Karuti's Beluga. It's Ceal Floyer's work, 'Til I Get it Right, which plays inside a tiny space adjacent to the video of the aquarium. My interlocutor hadn't realised that this is a point of overlap between the two shows, Archival Ramblings and Body, Machine, Location. The soundtrack of one washing into the other: and why not? The sound of the Aare as it rushes over the Schwellenmätteli weir interferes with the omnipresent traffic on Helvetiaplatz, and Ceal Floyer's piece crosses into Karuti's space. That's the thing about sound: it is not easily contained. Floyer's work, which was first shown in the Kunsthalle some years ago, is a take on Tammy Wynette's 1972 song in which she sings: "I'll just keep on falling in love 'til I get it right." By taking out the words "falling in love", Ceal Floyer gave the line even more poignancy than it has in the original - which is saying a lot: you don't have to like country music to hear the powerful emotions in the song.
I guess it can apply to anything one tries, and practices, and often fails. The funny thing, says the woman, is that falling in love is the only thing one can ever do right.
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