Lost Oscillations: Exploring a City’s Space and Time With an Interactive Auditory Art Installation

Presented at the 22nd International Conference on Auditory Display (ICAD-2016)Lost Oscillations is a spatio-temporal sound art installation that allows users to explore the past and present of a city's soundscape. Participants are positioned in the center of an octophonic speaker array; situated in the middle of the array is a touch-sensitive user interface. The user interface is a stylized representation of a map of Christchurch, New Zealand, with electrodes placed throughout the map. Upon touching an electrode, one of many sound recordings made at the electrode's real-world location is chosen and played; users must stay in contact with the electrodes in order for the sounds to continue playing, requiring commitment from users in order to explore the soundscape. The sound recordings have been chosen to represent Christchurch's development throughout its history, allowing participants to explore the evolution of the city from the early 20th Century through to its post-earthquake reconstruction. This paper discusses the motivations for Lost Oscillations before presenting the installation's design, development, and presentation

Complex: Physical Re-sonification of Urban Noise

Presented at the 20th International Conference on Auditory Display (ICAD2014), June 22-25, 2014, New York, NY.This paper explores the aesthetic and social values of the noises of modern urban soundscapes and discusses some strategies for boosting the accessibility and appreciation of works of sound art and experimental music that employ them. A proposed audiovisual installation––entitled complex––is outlined as a practical application of techniques designed to reveal the sonic aesthetics of urban technological noise, primarily through resonification and visualization. This will be achieved sonically and physically, by mapping sonic data collected from New York City soundscape (using the Citygram project) onto custom-designed mechatronic soundsculptures