Rejection letters make up focus of Beaverton artist’s installation

By Shasta Kearns Moore

The Beaverton Valley Times, Oct 9, 2008, Updated Oct 30, 2009

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“I can control the movement, the rocking of the pendulum, with sound you can’t hear but you can see,” Senn said.

Then, he brings up the vibrations to the point where the motion stops, but the sound is then audible.

“Much of my work works right across that divide,” he said. “Oftentimes it seems magical because of that, even to me.”

Visitors to the University of Washington-Tacoma can see an example of pendulum instruments at a permanent installation that has been operating since 1999. Senn also created a permanent Sound Garden in Tacoma at Point Defiance.

This latest work will run until Friday, Oct. 31, and is already getting interested comments from passersby.

“It’s a really cool idea, this whole monument to rejection,” said employee Matt Cavaness as he stopped to read the letters.

In a guest book, one woman wrote a lengthy passage encouraging Senn to keep trying and not to give up, despite his failures, a sentiment that surprised the artist.

“I didn’t think they would react this way. I’m actually quite successful,” he said.

See more of Senn’s work at www.newsense-intermedium.com.

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