Installation · 2021
Raumklang
Year 2021
Type Sound installation
Initiated by Zeno van den Broek & Robin Koek
Presented at FIBER, Muziekgebouw, The Grey Space
An object in a space which cannot be seen and cannot be touched, revealing itself through listening. Frozen sound becomes augmented architecture.

Raumklang creates a location-specific sound architecture, affected and unveiled by multiple visitors simultaneously. The augmented layer fully engages with the potential of sound, acoustics and interaction, deepening relationships with the spaces we and other lifeforms inhabit. The work is the result of a long-term artistic research trajectory which centralises the potential of sound, acoustics and interaction in order to move beyond the visual monopoly of architectural experience. The installation fosters a mutual cognitive extension, understanding the spaces surrounding us towards a culture of sentient auditory spatial awareness, enabling a new pathway to individual and collective experiencing of physical architectures and locations based on hyper-local sonic augmentation.

The auditory architectural interventions Raumklang realises are informed by the structural qualities and materialisation of the spatial boundaries of the location. These interventions form an immaterial sculptural foundation which allows the installation to emphasise as well as juxtapose the physical characteristics. Hereby the work forms a true hybrid extension of the naturally occurring spatial features and creates emergent phenomenological interrelationships. These connections build on the cultural history and contemporary meaning of the spaces utilising field recording techniques to sonically document different perspectives and timespaces of a site.

We use specialised recording methodologies to access non-human sound and consider the built environment as living sounding matter based on re-amplification and listening through the substrates. With these site-specific sound architectures we construct immersive nonlinear ecological documents of locations which engage with the full range of infra to ultrasound activities.

With Raumklang we have developed custom tracking and wearable technology which invites the visitors to wander freely through the installation. By movement, visitors reveal interspecies sound dialogues such as critter noise in fallen trees, echolocations from bats and resonant frequencies from buildings.

By making the unheard audible we aspire to foster mutualism, activating visitors to critically explore the spatial features and dynamics of a place and stimulate to build new relationships with their environment and each other, providing a means to reflect on all the hidden qualities of our daily surroundings.

In addition to the physical installation at STRP, online visitors can experience the sound architecture through the ears of another onsite visitor. The Raumklang hybrid environment visually depicts the visitor's trajectory in STRP's space and makes it possible to alternate between different paths, to experience multiple perspectives on spatial exploration.

Images Raumklang · 2021
Raumklang — installation view
Raumklang installation
Raumklang — at STRP
STRP Festival
Raumklang — installation at STRP
Photo: Boudewijn Bollmann, STRP 2023
Raumklang — Gardening, Amelisweerd
Gardening, Amelisweerd
Raumklang — wearable tracking technology
Wearable, Gardening
Raumklang — at FIBER, Muziekgebouw
FIBER, Muziekgebouw
Raumklang — at FIBER, Muziekgebouw
FIBER, Muziekgebouw
Video Raumklang · 2021
Credits
Initiated by
Zeno van den Broek
Robin Koek
Co-produced by
V2_ institute for the unstable media
Creative Coding Utrecht
Supported by
Creative Industries Fund NL, STRP, STEIM, Stichting Stokroos, Stichting Niemeijer Fonds, Machinerie Utrecht
Previous Under the Surface 2021 Next MA(N|CHINE) 2020