Breathing Volume

We’ve featured some works of Marco Canevacci and Marco Barotti last January: Sound of Light. With Breathing Volume, they continue making immersive environments. Where Sound of Light sonified the weather by looking at the sky and the sunlight, Breathing Volume plays with the notion of space in an audio-visual context. For five minutes, the public is embraced between breathing walls, constantly changing their physical volume. This creates the perception of being inside a living organism.

Four ventilators make the lungs breathe in the same way humans do, and subwoofers transform the pulsing bass frequencies into the soul of the organism. Breathing Volume unexpectedly steers the focus from what surrounds us, to what is immediate, here and now, offering a distorted reflection on our relationship with space, its distance and extension. Again, as with Sound of Light, it reminds me of Space Odyssey, this time very obviously, als because of the black speaker-monolith at the end of the space.

Heart Chamber Orchestra

This is another great project with the human body as main element. The music of the Heart Chamber Orchestra literally comes “from the heart”. The heartbeats of the musicians control the composition as well as the visuals accompanying the music. The orchestra consists of 12 classical musicians and the artist duo Terminalbeach.

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Listen to The Sonic Body

Have you ever wondered what your body sounds like, from the inside? I have, and I actually recorded some bowel sounds once using a stethoscope I borrowed from a doctor friend. The Sonic Body is an interactive installation which allows visitors to experience what the human body sounds like.

From the outside the installation does not reveal any of its secrets, it is just a plain wooden cylinder. While entering the ‘body’, visitors will see a glowing representation of our organs. They can explore the different sides of The Sonic Body by touching it. This will trigger the sounds, which are played back omnidirectionally to increase the feeling of immersion. 

The installation was created by Thomas Michalak, Harry Neve and Anna Orliac. To record all those bodily sounds they collaborated with a heart surgeon. They used instruments like stethoscopes and hydrophones and recorded in an anechoic chamber to capture even the slightest sound. 

The artist is not performing for an audience this time. It feels like we are intruders, literally listening to the artist’s inside. See The Sonic Body website to learn more about this highly intimate piece of art:

www.sonicbody.co.uk

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Staalhemel

Staalhemel (steel sky) is an interactive installation created by Christoph de Boeck. Using a wireless device for capturing brain waves, the participants brain activity influences the activity of the installation.

The steel sky itself is made up of 80 steel plates, and the sound is generated by pins hammering on the plates. I guess the most interesting experiment would be to try to keep the installation as quiet as possible.