Sound is certainly present, and many consider it life itself, medical research into the interaction between man and sound and connecting this interaction with the field of acoustics, architecture and ultimately with public space is a field that opens up new questions. The installation “Architecture of Metaphony” audibly strives to present within one architectural entity – a building – the relationships that occur within one biological entity – a human being.
The sound installation “Architecture of Metaphony” is the result of an algorithmic composition of physically generated sounds. The algorithm itself is the result of blood pressure measurements over a 24-hour period at 15-minute intervals. Each measurement recorded: heart rate, systolic blood pressure result and diastolic blood pressure result. Pulse is displayed in bps (beats per second) while pressure measurements are displayed as numerical values. The measurement data were obtained thanks to the cooperation with Dr. Zaim Jatić's team from the Center for Teaching and Scientific Research JUDZKS, and the author of the sound installation “Architecture of Metaphonics” is also a diabetic who was also diagnosed with hypertension thanks to the aforementioned measurements.
Blood pressure is not measured as a frequency in Hz, but for the purposes of artistic – sound – presentation of blood pressure oscillations and their connection with the heartbeat, the numerical value of the measurement was taken as if it were a frequency. The result of this artistic manipulation of measurements is an electro-acoustic composition of sounds that aurally demonstrate blood pressure oscillations. In order to enhance the musical impression of this intervention, the tones were additionally played on the piano.
Since the composition is reproduced in a public space, by carefully establishing the position of the sound monitors and harmonizing them with the acoustics of the space and the reflections of the same as well as the volume of the tones, the installation tends to find the “sweet spot” of the acoustics so that the synthesis of tones in the authentic acoustics of the space can take place at that point. to which the installation is placed.
All sounds are physically generated with the help of a program that is a free platform for physical signal processing: pure data.
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