Sonic Geography
Sonic Geography is an interactive sound installation that addresses place, identity, and urban development through field recordings of Kunming, China. Sonic Geography allows gallery visitors to explore, interact with, and conduct a symphony of everyday sounds collected around the city during a period a drastic urban renewal.
Using field recordings captured from all over Kunming, I created an navigable environment in which participants and gallery visitors can listen closely to, interact with, and explore the everyday sounds of their city. The objective of this installation is to give participants an opportunity to contemplate the seemingly "casual" and "mundane" soundscape of the city, and to realize the symphony of human interaction that culminates in the sounds that define us as people, a community, and as a city.
Upon entering the installation space, participants will hear pre-recorded sounds from rooftops, underpasses, quiet alleyways, loud storefront sidewalks, as well as recordings of geographic landmarks, such as the bird and flower market, Dianchi lake, etc. The sounds inside the installation, like the sounds in the city, are always changing, thus each participant will walk away with a unique experience.
Sonic Geography makes use of my Traffic computer vision software, and the hours upon hours of field recordings that I have collected from all around Kunming.
Year Produced: 2011
Dimensions: 4 meters x 4 meters x 4 meters, variable
Materials: Loudspeakers, camera, computer with custom software
Technique: Computer vision, ambisonics
Credits: Curation - TCG Nordica Gallery
Keywords: Kunming, quadrophonic, field recording, computer vision
