gleAM – an ambisonic sound sculpture for BESSY II VSR and an Icosahedral Loudspeaker.
A cooperation between researchers of the Department of Accelerator Physics at the Helmholtz-Center Berlin and gksh.
Premiere at KONTAKTE Festival, Academy of Arts Berlin on 30.09.2017 and four performances at Helmholtz-Center Berlin on 17.11.2017. Also performed at INSONIC2017 conference at ZKM Karlsruhe 07.12.2017, Int. Spatial Composition Workshop at TU Berlin 14.01.2018 and Edgard Varèse professorship concert at museum for musical instruments (SIM) 23.02.2018 – Curt Sachs Hall Berlin .
A radio report by RBB Berlin about gleAM for BESSY II VSR at the Helmholtz- Center Berlin.
The starting point for the two-year collaboration was a worldwide unique project in accelerator research. The Berlin Electron Storage ring BESSY II will be expanded to a variable pulse length storage ring (VSR). Due to the upgrade, long and short light pulses will be available at each measuring station. Physical phenomena such as interference or the control of the beam play an important role, some of which have analogies in acoustics. These analogies form basic motifs that can be experienced in the space with the help of synthetic sounds, recorded noises, physical effects and audible data-sets as an acoustic sculpture.
The artistic motivation was to develop an ephemeral sculptural sound composition making it accessible to an audience with an advanced sound projection technology, also developing, the icosahedral loudspeaker using beamforming. Physical phenomena of the electron storage ring, such as the synchrotron radiation caused by accelerated and rotating electrons, vibration interferences, high-frequency beamforming and therefore necessary engineering constructions such as dipole and quadrupole magnets and superconducting cavities for generating and “tuning” the frequencies of synthetic light, sometimes millions of times brighter than the sun, became the motivational basis for this new space-sound composition. The aim of the work was the careful search for the intersection between the disciplines of art and science in the Now.
Both disciplines significantly influence the way how the world is described, experienced and understood. What creates knowledge today can only be found by provoking experiences at the threshold of the conceptual. And these frontiers are just where art can be experienced as well.
As last performance of the Edgard Varèse professorship at SIM Berlin “gleAM” was reviewed by The Hudson Review New York.
