Sound artists, Nikki Sheth and Emma Margetson have combined field recordings with processed sounds to create distinctive soundscapes of different sculptures across the University of Birmingham campus.
Sound Sculptures is a project exploring the relationship between sound and sculpture along the University of Birmingham’s Sculpture Trail. Distinctive soundscapes respond to the physical properties and characteristics of each sculpture, transporting the listener between natural and abstract sound-worlds.
The project Sound Sculptures was initially commissioned for Arts & Science Festival 2018 curated and delivered by the Cultural Engagement Team here at the University of Birmingham. In 2018, the theme for the festival was stop/start which explored themes of life, death, time, movement, migration, attitudes, behaviours and much more.
The first phase of the project consisted of 9 compositions based upon sculptures on the Sculpture Trail Map. We did not do all of the 13 sculptures due to accessibility issues at the time.
The soundwalk followed the existing University Sculpture Trail Map which was created as a guide to encourage and invite members of the public, students and staff to explore and celebrate the variety of sculptures located across the university campus (-with some being widely accessible and some in more discrete locations). The map highlights a key selection of these sculptures, which include a range of styles, subjects and shapes of sculpture. It is also important to note, that there is a larger collection of sculptures in The Cultural Collections at the University which are not included on this map. This has provided further avenues of exploration for additional phases to the Sound Sculptures project, including on projects we will be working on later this year.
We felt that providing an alternative experience of the sculpture trail may provide the listener/observer with a different interpretation and experience of the trail through the act of active listening, with the view of hopefully bringing in new audiences or existing to interpret the sculptures in varying and different ways. This project is site-specific and site-responsive:
“site-specific”: work made specifically for a site
“site-responsive”: work made in response to and encounter with, a site.
For the research and development phases, to begin, the artists followed the sculpture trail, considering and investigating the relationship between sound and sculpture, using its physical properties (-form, materials), context (-history) and sonic location (geography and locality) as a starting point and point of reference for each composition.
The composition process involved each of the composers working on their pieces individually, but often coming together for listening sessions and to share recordings for the collaborative aspects of the project. As the works were part of the sculpture trail meant that the duration needed to be relatively short in order for the audience to listen to each work whilst following the length of the sculpture trail. Therefore, the pieces ranged from 1 - 3 minutes long as the project had to consider walking times between each of the sculptures. In total the whole trail takes an hour to complete.
For 2019, the project has expanded to explore themes of celebration, change, illumination, hope with a larger-scale composition being commissioned by Cultural Collections for the opening of the Green Heart Festival at the University of Birmingham with the creation of a new work inspired by Ancestor I by Barbara Hepworth. The four movements of the composition respond to the physical form of the sculpture: head, torso, hips and legs.
The Ancestor I sound sculpture took two forms: a soundwalk and as a sound installation.
The soundwalk included previous sculptures and excerpts of the longer Ancestor I composition and the sound installation was the full length version of the piece playing on loop throughout the Green Heart Festival 2019. We had custom made speaker enclosures made that were installed underneath each of the benches in front of the sculpture and used each bundle of speakers as a left and right image.
Through members of the public engaging with the work via a variety of platforms this project has increased public engagement with the project and the University’s established Sculpture Trial. Whether this being as active participants on the soundwalk, indirect engagement through the sound installation or listening at home through Soundcloud this project has engaged with wider audiences and has encouraged active listening of electroacoustic works.
This project is a collaboration between sound artists Nikki Sheth & Emma Margetson, the Arts & Science Festival, the Cultural Collections team and the SOUNDwalker app.
Sound Sculptures 2018
Sound Sculptures 2019
