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Museum of Sydney 1994-2004
Randomised sound , 10 Loudspeakers, 10 Channels
Complementing a giant videowall installed across three floors of the Museum of Sydney, the soundscape is based on field recordings from remnant natural habitats around Sydney. The soundscape is an imagined environment, a dynamic space delineated by movement, timbre and the tactile, which replaces another imagined environment: the pristine natural soundscape.
The listening perspective constantly changes as visitors move about, encountering aspects of the soundscape from a number of perspectives. Using programmed random sequencing, the soundscape replicates the unpredictable experience of the Australian bush. Exclamatory bird calls and seemingly incongruous sounds compete for attention. Textures and events shift from sparse to extremely dense. Familiar sounds are heard from unusual perspectives as part of a 'defamiliarisation' process where the listeners' experience becomes analogous to that of colonial settlers entering Sydney's bush environs for the first time.
Habitats represented include woodland, mangrove, coastal, sub-tropical rainforest and wet sclerophyll forest. Over 45 bird species are represented along with frogs, marsupials and insects.
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