THOMAS BEY WILLIAM BAILEY'S "ANECHOIC CHAMBER"

EPISODE 16

Bryan Lewis Saunders

Welcome to the 16th episode of Anechoic Chamber, featuring Johnson City, TN-based artist Bryan Lewis Saunders. Working in a wide array of disciplines from drawing to sound recording, Saunders is in many ways the quintessential American folk artist: having himself identified risk-taking as one of the key identifying features of American creativity, his own forays into this field have coupled the boundary-testing ethos of 1970s American performance artists with an intensely dedicated level of documentation that itself combines scientific rigor and journalistic honesty. For decades now, Saunders has maintained his vow to draw daily self-portraits that reveal fluctuations in his psychic makeup, and has done this in tandem with projects in which he imposes severe restraints upon himself: living for a month deprived of sight. Drawing while under the influence of a new drug for two straight weeks. Subjecting himself to extreme temperatures for extensive periods, and choosing to document the effects of completely monochromatic living environments during quarantine. In addition to this, Saunders’ experiments with sleep-talking and his unique form of confessional performance known as “stand-up tragedy” hint at an individual for whom no obscure corner of human experiential terrain is to be left un-explored or un-mapped.

Credits: Remixed excerpts of Bryan Lewis Saunders' "Deaf Month", "Blind Month", and "Temperature Month" Vinyls by Thomas Bey William Bailey. Background music by Razen. Audio recordings by Christopher Fleeger, Bryan Lewis Saunders and Thomas Bey William Bailey. 

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