(Image by Fanni Fazakas at 4DSOUND)
In August I was in residence at 4DSOUND (Arts Quarter Budapest, Hungary) collaborating with 4DSOUND’s director, composer Paul Oomen to develop a new interface and audio design that would give a spatial ‘shape’ to my sonic interpretations of participants’ bodies that I have so been trying to realise throughout the duration of this project. This new interface and sound design was developed to be presented at TodaysArt NL 2015 festival in Den Haag, Nederland in September.
Here are some images of the residency and collaboration (Images by Fanni Fazakas at4D):
About 4DSOUND:
4DSOUND is a state of the art/ institute of sound / avant garde system of sonic technology that produces unique and dynamic (4D) sound designs – designs that add completely new dimensions to audience experience/engagement with sound. 4DSOUND provides a space/platform for exploring new forms of embodied consciousness via immersive sound designs. These designs create new fields of complex interaction between the audience, artists, composers and technologists via the unique features of the 4D sound system – as a stage that converges artistic vision, complex audio design and bodily interaction with new sonic worlds.
Visit their website for more info on their system, creative team and unique projects: http://4dsound.net/
TodaysArt NL 2015:
‘Circadian at E.ON Electriciteitsfabriek’ – my images:
The space of E.ON
The 4D system within E.ON
To view the programme and full list of participating artists (including myself, Marco Donnarumma, Lisa Park, Kazuya Nagaya, and John Connell & Florence To) and descriptions of their work see: http://todaysart.nl/2015/program/4dsound-circadian/
This festival investigated ‘how spatial listening influences conscious states throughout the day and night. Performances explore how to physically connect the listener with the surrounding space through movement, bio-physical media and psycho-acoustic stimulation’ (4DSOUND, 2015). In this festival I took 16 people’s pulses and performed 16 live pulse soundscape compositions throughout the 48 hour programme (see images below).
(The following images are by Georg Schroll at 4DSOUND).
In the E.ON space – lower floor :
The 4DSOUND system in E.ON – upper floor:
Images of the audio design :
An image showing how one can move through the 4DSOUND system with the interface – enabling me to adjust the sounds and their expressions to specific locations within the 4D system:
Audience/participants:
4DSOUND Director Paul Ooman and I discussing the interface/audio design – with Ooman demonstrating a range of sounds for each of the 5 elements to audience members:
(Image by Fanni Fazakas at 4DSOUND)
Ooman’s new interface designed in Budapest specifically for Pulse Project allowed me to creatively interpret the oscillating inner landscapes of each participant’s body much more directly than all of my previous work with SuperCollider (see earlier posts on this process). Ooman’s designs also offered a more profound exploration of the alchemical relationship of the 5 elements of Chinese medical philosophy themselves – as distinct sonic shapes and bodily processes… Ooman designed a complex interface containing at least 5 inter-relating audio objects for each of the 5 elements according to traditional music and medicine theories according to the text Huangdi nanjing – dating from at least 1C BCE (see the 1st and 2nd images of the residency in Budapest above – the interface is shown via the ipad which displays the audio objects we were developing/working with).
The bespoke audio design and complex system of 64 speakers made it possible to create audio works that could be ‘sculpted’ and modulated live allowing me to produce bespoke audio works that have a direct relation with the bodies of the participants of the research as well as the listeners of the pulse performances. These new modes of working with live sound and audience participation far exceed the scope of standard sound design and multi-channel elaboration of soundscapes (see images displaying the audio design and audience participation above) – offering a completely new approach to composing and to listening to immersive and embodied sounds.
In terms of how 4D really transformed my research, the new interface/sound design created at 4DSOUND solved a major problem I have been struggling with – how to communicate the hidden and intimate act of pulse reading to a wider public within a live setting. By giving the pulse reading sessions and their playback via immersive sound system a much greater public platform at E.ON within the 4D system – the audience could experience a meditative listening to the emerging pulse soundscapes of others (or their own pulse reading) as a ‘new’ approach to listening to the human body (via my artistic re-interpretation of Chinese medico-philosophical mappings of participant’s bodies).
This experience was further enhanced by the 4DSOUND artists’ talks that discussed the sound works (and the concepts they adopt) produced during the festival. In the images below: Lisa Park, Marco Donnarumma and myself participating in the artist’s panel discussion of our works in the ‘Circadian’ programme – with 4D Director Paul Ooman chairing the discussion.
(Images by Georg Schroll at 4DSOUND)
Michelle Lewis-King 