Calumet in Dub focuses on Long’s research-based work delving into the ecology and soundscapes of the Southeast Side of Chicago along the Calumet and Little Calumet River area. Inspired initially by a story that aired on the BBC about the relationship of the Little Calumet River to the history of the Great Migration, Long has investigated how housing, labor, and environmental activism has coalesced in this location and how historic figure, Hazel Johnson considered the “mother of the environmental justice movement,” diligently brought these issues to light. Other inspiration was found in Annea Lockwood’s work A Soundmap of the Hudson River, and production techniques found in the works of Dub producers King Tubby and Lee “Scratch” Perry.

This exhibition consists of an 8-channel speaker installation in the main gallery, accompanied by two rooms that shed light on the research that has informed the work. The population demographics, ecological information, and pollution statistics about the Calumet region provide the raw data that Long uses in this body of work and his experimental sound art practice translates visual and text-based information into sonic experiences.

Long’s experimental sound practice uses sound from direct field recordings, sonified research data, and experimentation with various inputs and outputs. This exhibition includes sounds from historically significant locations of the Great Migration in the Calumet area, such as wind in the trees or bubbling water of a stream. Long gathers other sounds by processing data through inputs such as the TwoTone webapp (which allows him to assign a particular note or pitch to the numerical data in order to turn it into sound) or the PlantWave device (that reads plant biorhythms through electrodes connected to a plant). Once sounds have been collected, effects are used to manipulate sound and further creative methods of editing, splicing, and moving sound through multiple audio channels are used to transport the listener to different locations via the soundscapes he creates.