Livespace

Livespace was an artistic collaboration with Lucie Hernandez, Jane Vippond, Carl Rohumaa (Thames Valley University) and Alex Schembri (Designer's Republic) that explored environmental cyclical systems. The approach was to identify individual components and to make it perceptible how they overlay and influence each other.

The final large-scale audio-visual installation exhibited at Waterman's Art Centre used microphones and cameras to collect live data from both in and outside the gallery, and reacted to weather and human activity cycles.

Installation at Waterman's Art Gallery, London, November 2003.

The development of the work was supported by the London College of Music and Media, Waterman's Arts Centre and London Metropolitan University.

Concept

Livespace focused on natural as well as human activity cycles. The aim was to make the gallery space come 'alive' by capturing, interpreting and representing data from sources in the immediate natural and man-made environment.

Microphones and cameras collected live data from both in and outside the gallery, which was processed and played back as a series of images and real-time surround sound.

The images were collated by a server and played back in a montage style, which allowed visitors to see present events as well as the recent past in form of time lapse visuals. The microphones picked up natural sounds (weather, wind, bird sounds) as well as human sounds (road and air traffic, gallery activities), which provided an immersive listening experience as a surround sound mix.