Sound Pool
November, 2006 - December, 2006
Sound Pool was an interactive audio-visual installation created for a solo exhibition at Banbury Museum, and developed during my year-long residency on the Resonance digital arts programme at The Animation Station, Banbury.
Sound Pool presented visitors with a virtual pool of water reflecting local skies, accompanied by a slowly shifting chordal soundscape. Movement in the space caused ripples across the pool's surface, which in turn brought into focus sounds from everyday Banbury, before slowly dissolving away again. Visitors could play with the installation like a large, intuitive instrument. Others could simply sit and absorb the fragmented narratives and familiar snatches of sound as others moved about, or wait a few minutes for a short shower of 'rain' to bring forth a new selection of sounds like the retuning of a radio.
This was my first major project to combine generative and interactive components into one work. It was important to me to find a suitable balance so that the interactivity was intuitive yet not predictable, and the work would continue to provide an interesting experience without interaction. All source material for the work was captured locally, the chordal soundscape created by passing real-world sounds through a variety of comb filters and delays. Like most of my work, the installation was continually changing, each moment a unique and unrepeatable experience - the carefully mapped archives of source material juxtaposed with the transient nature of the work an attempt to echo and subvert the traditional context of the museum.
The interactive nature of the installation made it an ideal environment for performance, and Oxford-based dance artist Jenny Parrott performed three improvised solos within the Sound Pool during the exhibition.
Sound Pool was shown alongside the generative projection Trees of the Cherwell Valley, another work created specifically for the museum during the Resonance residency. Both works were created using my own software framework. The residency and the exhibition were financially supported by Arts Council England and Cherwell District Council, and project managed by Victoria Leighton.