Speechless is a multilayered exploration of what we speak of, for example about the precarious state of the world. Can we speak about what needs to be known, discussed and disputed if words are missing or even banned? How do we remember words that get erased? Part poetic gesture and radical expression, Speechless addresses the power of language within political contexts and our ability to understand and discuss environmental degradation. The work is inspired in part by recent debate in Florida's state government regarding the use of 'controversial' terms such as climate change and global warming; words that were banned from the official documents. What one cannot speak about does not exist, or does it?

Speechless consists of a custom-built aviary, which houses four parrots learning to speak selected phrases from T.S. Elliot's seminal 1922 poem, The Waste Land, comparing landscape devastated by war to the ecological devastation and extinction of today. These fragments are performed as a sound piece that can be heard, at intervals, in the space. The aviary is furnished with a jumble of sculptural letters that appear in the terms global warming, climate change, and sustainability.

Speechless draws on the uncanny ability of parrots to learn to speak human speech as a way of exploring the Aristotelian notion that we are political animals, constantly engaged in attempts to influence and govern one another.