The State Of The Sea Installation 1994

The State of Sea installation at Tate Gallery St Ives 1994 - involved the transmission of a live image of the sea carried on a laser beam via mirrors to the sunken courtyard in the centre of the building where it was demodulated and viewable on a small screen set into a wooden wall mounted Unit. The video diary was kept during the development and sitting of the piece.

Sonic Graffiti@RENEW Rooms Liverpool 16/1/08

We would like to invite you to the above event to test out our audio collection system for the Hope Street Project as follows:


16 January 2008
Start Time: 6.00pm
End Time: 8.00pm
Location: RENEW Rooms 82 Wood Street Liverpool

Come and use your mobile phone as a recording tool for sounds or comment about the city. Contribute through our answering system to a repository of voices and urban noise. These sounds will be randomly distributed within a spatial sound installation forming an immersive and updating ambient urban sonic backdrop at the RENEW Rooms.

The phone line, 0151 231 4801 , will be open between 10th - 15th Jan for you to leave your sounds (no more than ten seconds ). Be - poetic, rhythmic, critical, sonically sensitive, urban ....

Contact:anna.johnson@member.riba.org

Can You Hear Me?

The Hope Street Project represents that third phase of a series of installations working with the design and composition of string sculptures.

Phase One was presented at The Old Library in Cardiff in May 2003, in response to a commission by Cardiff 2008 and The British Council. New Young Europeans presented the public with a series of photographic images of young asylum seekers, and also written testaments by the young participants. Underscoring this was an aural tapestry made up of the voices of these young people asking the question “can you hear me?” in their mother tongue. This diffused into the exhibition space through a relay of small string structures. An open mike was also made available for visitors to record their own responses into the archive. The phrase holds a poignant irony that is particular to Cardiff. It is the phrase first spoken by Marconi. The first spark of telegraphic communication took place between Lavernock Point and Flatholm in the Bristol Channel.

Laser Test

Beams of light link the towers of the two cathedrals along Hope Street. These will be visible on misty or rainy evenings, but they are also the conduits for voices to be passed between the two buildings. What is being sent is a growing collection of hopeful phrases and utterances that are drawn directly from the people of Liverpool distributed through a contemplative soundspace that links the two Cathedrals.

To achieve the above aspiration means that the project team have had to overcome significant technical challenges to use green laser to transmit audio between the Liverpool Cathedral and Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral. Green laser is being used as a medium because it has superior visibility to red laser. Therefore, we will then be able to achieve the kind of iconic image which the project team wants when the installation is in situ later this year.

A test of the green laser's visiblity was carried in late November last year. The above video was taken of the laser as the team carried out the test from the tower of the Liverpool Cathedral. The laser was fired from the tower towards the Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral. Not only was it visible from the tower but could also be clearly seen from the ground.

This gave some Liverpool people a short glimpse of what will be visible in the night skies during October and November of this year.

Hope Street Project

Liverpool is European Capital of Culture 2008.

The Hope Street Project is an innovative art installation, which will link the Liverpool Cathedral and the Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral during October and November of the Capital of Culture year.

The art installation will be a laser linking the towers of the two Cathedrals. The laser beams will also be conduits for voices passing between the two buildings, using phrases drawn directly from the people of Liverpool. The voices will pass through voice sound instruments installed in each cathedral, which abstract the words into string vibrations. This will create a chordal and harmonic backdrop to the delicate tapestry of voices. The piece will be sensitive to the harmonic architecture of each space but also mixes these spaces into an overlapping sound-scape. This will offer a gentle and discreet ambience for reflection and contemplation.

The installation will also be marked by a concert event to be performed in November 2008. The concert will be performed using a score composed in response to the installation.

The Hope Street Project represents the third phase of a series of collaborative installations between artist and musician Peter Appleton and composer Simon Thorne. The project is supported by a project manager Colin Dilnot; laser engineers Ken Owen and Keith Snook; software developer Ben Mitchell; project engineer Wayne Stevens and web designer Maya Ziglio. Stelios Giannoulakis, an electro-acoustic composer based in Athens, created the original digital system that drives the installation. This digital system has been developed further by Ben Mitchell.

The project is funded by the Arts Council England North West, the Performing Rights Society and Liverpool John Moores University. The Automatic, a research group and I-Lab facility in collaboration support the project with the International Centre for Digital Content, Liverpool John Moores University.