Susan Philipsz
Leila Akhmetova on screen in A Single Voice. Photo supplied

A Single Voice

Susan Philipsz’s mesmerising installation, showing at the NGV Triennial, uses a violinist on screen and a series of speakers to “visualise the sound”.

This summer, the NGV Triennial will bring works by more than 100 internationally respected artists to Melbourne. Among them is Susan Philipsz, a Scottish artist who won the Turner Prize in 2010 for Lowlands. This was the first work using sound as its primary medium to be awarded the Turner, previously won by artists such as Anish Kapoor, Damien Hirst and Rachel Whiteread.

The work on show in Melbourne, A Single Voice, was inspired by Karl-Birger Blohmdahl’s 1958 Aniara, a 12-tone...