News Release
5 Minute Oscillations of the Sun
A temporary, site-specific sound installation by artist Caroline Devine
Located in the Dome, Theatre District, Milton Keynes
21 June – 29 July 2012
Free / Audible daily, 12 noon to 9pm
From today, 21 June, Midsummer’s Day, until 29 July, artist Caroline Devine
provides a rare opportunity for people to “eavesdrop” on normally inaudible
signals from the very heart of our solar system and to “hear” waves that have
been measured on the solar surface, through her latest, site-specific sound
installation, 5 Minute Oscillations of the Sun, in the Dome, Theatre District, Central
Milton Keynes. The installation can be heard daily between 12 noon and 9pm
by anyone walking into the Dome, and is one of numerous exciting Summer of
Culture events offered across Milton Keynes this year.
Designed to work specifically within the architecture and acoustic of the Dome,
Caroline uses this multi-channel composition to explore naturally occurring radio
signals and the solar activity of the sun. Caroline’s work regularly focuses on
voices and signals that are obscured, silenced or absent. In the case of 5 Minute
Oscillations of the Sun, courtesy of research from the School of Physics and
Astronomy at the University of Birmingham, Caroline has transformed data on the
natural resonances present within the interior of the sun into a composition that is
punctuated by passages of natural radio emissions.
The composition alternates between two “listening modes”, one acoustic, the
other electromagnetic and is presented via eight speakers in the roof of the
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Dome, with each speaker in effect serving as an individual “voice”. Additionally
it will be possible to listen to a recording of the entire composition in MK Gallery’s
first floor Reading Space from 28 June during advertised gallery opening hours.
Caroline says “I chose the Dome as a site for the piece as it offers an
extraordinary acoustic that enables it to be used like a giant instrument. My
composition can best be experienced at the centre of the Dome where natural
amplification occurs and the curved roof acts as an “acoustic lens”, focusing the
signals and magically editing out much of the extraneous ambient sound.”
Caroline Devine was winner of the Milton Keynes Community Foundation’s Arts
Bursary Award in 2010 and has exhibited in MK Gallery’s ‘New Art MK ‘ group
exhibition (summer 2011) and this May participated in the group exhibition
‘Station X’, a multi-sensory insight into the derelict buildings of Bletchley Park,
shown in MK Gallery Project Space. She is currently included in ‘Soundworks’ at
the ICA, London (19 June – 16 September 2012), an exhibition featuring one
hundred new sound works produced by artists from all over the world.
Notes to Editors
About the Artist
Caroline Devine was born in London in 1969. She studied at London College of
Communication and currently works in Milton Keynes. Caroline explores voices
and signals that are obscured, silenced or absent. She has a particular interest in
the use of space as a compositional parameter and her practice includes
electro-acoustic composition, sound installation and theatre.
Recent exhibitions:
2012 - 5 Minute Oscillations of the Sun outdoor sound installation, Milton Keynes
2012 - Station X – Project Space, MK Gallery
2011 – Community Without Propinquity – Project Space, MK Gallery
2011 – New Art MK – MK Gallery
2011 – Step Sequence - Tyneside Cinema, Newcastle
2010 – Sonic Arts Jukebox - Sonic Art Oxford
Recent theatre work:
2011 - Captain Ko and the Planet of Rice – Dancing Brick Theatre Company,
Riverside Studios, London, Brighton Festival, Pulse Festival, Sampled Festival
2010 - A L I C E – Dancing Brick Theatre Company, Battersea Arts Centre
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Further Information About 5 Minute Oscillations of the Sun by Caroline Devine
During the “acoustic listening mode”, a microtonal composition, informed by
data on the sun’s natural resonances, plays throughout the Dome. The sun
resonates like a giant instrument and this produces vibrations that can be
measured. Data collected by the BiSON research team at Birmingham University
has been sped up by a factor of one million to bring the frequencies within the
range of human hearing. Caroline has translated this data into sound using a
tone generator and all the frequencies heard within the piece are a
transposition of overtones measured on the surface of the sun. There are three
different acoustic mode sections and, together with the electromagnetic
listening modes that punctuate them, they provide a half hourly overall cycle for
the piece.
The “electromagnetic listening mode” allows a visitor to hear natural radio
emissions. These signals surround us at all times but cannot be heard under
normal circumstances. In order to hear the delicate natural radio signals buried
beneath man-made communications and electrical interference, it is necessary
to get away from the electromagnetic smog of built up areas and power lines
and pick up the signals with a VLF receiver that converts them to acoustic form.
Ironically, these tiny, delicate static signals with names such as whistlers, auroral
chorus and sferics originate from massive solar emissions, lightning and space
weather events. VLF activity has been high this year and the signals used in 5
Minute Oscillations of the Sun are from a whistler storm on the evening of 28th
February 2012 that was captured by Paul Nicholson and Wolf Buscher at their VLF
monitoring stations in Todmorden, UK and Bielefeld, Germany.
Original data are courtesy of the Birmingham Solar-Oscillations Network (BiSON)
research team, School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Birmingham
VLF recordings are courtesy of Paul Nicholson and Wolf Büscher
Project Support
5 Minute Oscillations of the Sun has been made possible with public funding from
Arts Council England and has received additional support from MK Gallery. The
project is part of the Milton Keynes Summer of Culture.
Press Information
For press information, interviews or images please contact:
Caroline Devine
Email:
Mobile:
Web:
caroline@devine.co.uk
07939 021971
www.5-minute-oscillations.co.uk
Ends
Date of issue: 21 June 2012
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