ST-LAB 2021
- FIND DIRECTIONS TO DE FABRIEK EINDHOVEN
- SENSORY THRESHOLD on INSTAGRAM
Sensory Threshold
LAB 2021 - OHRIVERSUM
A project initiated by Katherina Heil in collaboration with
Alexander Heil and Rik Möhlmann at De Fabriek Eindhoven.
‘As a particle of the atmosphere is never lost, so sound is
never lost. A strain of music or a simple tone will vibrate in
the air forever and ever, decreasing according to a fixed ratio.
The diffusion of the agitation extends in all directions, like
the waves in a pool, but the ear is unable to detect it beyond a
certain point. It is well known that some individuals can
distinguish sounds which to others under precisely similar
circumstances are wholly lost. Thus the fault is not in the
sound itself, but in our organ of hearing, and a tone once in
existence is always in existence.’ [Florence McLandburgh The
Automaton Ear 1876]
I am walking on the beach. The wind swirls around my body. The
waves wash the shore, crashing onto the land in an endless
phasing repetition, creating an oscillating swell of noise. I
encounter a sea shell. I lift it towards my ear – a maze of
sound reveals itself to me. We live immersed in a world of
sound. However, most of the sounds are filtered out by the shape
of our ear.
With this project we want to include ourselves deeply within
this world, which extends beyond our daily experience. And thus
we began our intuitive search for the relations between the ear,
its form, and the resulting sound experience. Eventually, all
human ears are built using the same blueprint. Nevertheless,
every ear is uniquely shaped like a fingerprint and thus
influences our subjective acoustic experience of the world. One
could say, that listening beings all together live in their
subjective sonic worlds. Therefore, we invented the concept of
the Ohriversum (German ‘Ear-verse’) in which the entirety of all
listening beings establishes a spatial constellation of these
individual worlds. ‘Ohriversum’ takes place as part of the
‘Sensory Threshold LAB’. A group of artists exploring the
inaudible dimensions of our reality, forming new collaborations,
narratives and metaphors.
Katherina Heil, Alexander Heil, Rik Möhlmann, Sarah Rose Guitian
Nederlof, Farzané Nouri, Gijsje Heemskerk, Kim David Bots.
EXHIBITION July 5th to August 20th, 2021
Vernissage 20th August
performances and interventions from 5pm
onwards