Most art installations, however quirky, are visual.
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But "Bus Station," one of the projects included in the city of Olympia`s Here Today, will be installed on the downtown transit station`s public-address system.

"I`ve always had this fantasy of taking over that sound system," said Jenn Kliese, who created "Bus Station" with fellow musician Jeff Shannon. "I thought of it years ago when they started putting classical music on there. I thought, what would it be like to create another kind of soundscape that surprises people or engages them in some way?"

Various mediums

"Bus Station" is one of eight projects in the second Here Today, kicking off Saturday at the Olympia Farmers Market and continuing throughout August. The temporary public art projects - including visual art, performance art and writing - will be seen and heard throughout downtown.

"People will encounter these projects whether they go looking for the art or whether the art just happens to be in the space that they`re in," said Stephanie Johnson, arts and events manager for the city of Olympia. "Here Today allows our citizens to look at our community through the eyes of these artists, and to gain a different perspective on where they live."

The projects make statements about the environment, history and other cultures, or - as in "Bus Station" - about how much of life goes past without many people even noticing it.

"One of our goals was to change the concept of Muzak, to have it be something not so much that imposes on the space but more something that reflects the space," Kliese said. "We want to get people to stop, to ponder, to reflect and to imagine." "Bus Station" incorporates experimental music in a variety of styles, plus audio clips of interviews Kliese did with bus riders about their memorable experiences.

Kliese, who plays multiple instruments solo and with many K Records artists, and Shannon, a guitarist known for his work in Collective of Dirt, the Pasties and Kite, created about four hours of music for the project.

"It`s really meant for people to just experience in passing," Kliese said. "It`s a space that you enter into, not a thing that is experienced from beginning to end.

"That`d be a marathon," she added, laughing. "You`d be sitting on that concrete bench for a long time." 
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