Alyce Santoro is one of those women that you think exists only in fiction; A futuristic character bravely challenging herself in the face of convention and nature wearing nothing but her own creations of a “Satellite Dish Hat,” and a “Sonorous Superhero Suit” made of fabric woven from upcycled cassette tape.

The Marfa, Texas based multimedia artist and homesteader explores new approaches to environment and society through weaving a revolutionary textile — Sonic Fabric — made of 50% cassette tapes and 50% thread. Santoro gets the tape for her upcycling project from a company that does audio books for the Library of Congress, which is slowly switching over to digital.

The large amounts of unused audiobook tape are first wound on large spools called “pancakes”and then woven on a loom from the 1940s in a small mill just outside of Providence, Rhode Island. While the futuristic fabric is odd enough to consider as part of the makeup of clothing or any other woven textile, the fact that it makes sound when woven is even more extraordinary.

In a current exhibit at the Gasser-Grunert Gallery in Manhattan, Santoro created a life-sized boat sail made from the fabric and embedded recorded samples collected on and under the streets of New York City onto the sail itself. Visitors to the show can also experience the fabric a different way by listening to it and pulling a Sonic Fabric Reader” over it, which in turn plays through a small amp.

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