Oorwonde - a tactile experience

Laura Maes

The exposition focuses on Oorwonde, a specific practical experiment within the research project Sounding sound art. The work, which falls somewhere between a sound installation and an interactive performance, consists of specially constructed stainless steel operating table upon which visitors, or ‘patients’ are invited to undergo ‘aural surgery’. Next to the concept and construction of Oorwonde, related practices are discussed in terms of their use of subsonic sound in interactive works or installations. The exposition introduces contextual information in regard to the artist’s broader work on the question of what constitutes ‘sound art’, while it’s main purpose remains the description and analysis of this new sound work, as a piece of artistic research.

When measuring people’s dimensions, I noticed a high deviation in the distance between the middle of the neck and the tailbone. Consequently, the contact point at the buttocks had to have a larger shape. After an experiment with a subwoofer that proved to be too fragile, a vibrator motor attached to a circular plate turned out to be an appropriate solution to cover a larger surface.

v i b r a t o r m o t o r

s o u n d p r o d u c i n g e l e m e n t s

C O N S T R U C T I O N

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