KOMPASS / Sannerud skogfrøarkiv

Sannerud skogfrøarkiv
Sannerud forest seed plantation

The Sannerud forest seed plantation in Hedmark, east-Norway, has fields of spruce, birch and alder, farmed to provide genetically healthy seeds. The trees are planted in grids to collect seeds and pine cones, and the trunks of the spruces are felled at a height of 3-5 meters. The recordings from the plantation fields were made over several days from dawn to early afternoon.


Sannerud Spruce

The spruce seed plantation is located next to the motorway, which makes traffic the most present sound of the place. A microphone was placed inside the metal pipe where cameras and recording devices were mounted, recording the sounds “trapped” in time in the pipe; the pipe creates longitudinal waves that sounds like coir-like resonances.

Photo Ellen Røed
Sound Signe Lidén

Sannerud Alder

The sound is recorded by a contact microphone through a textile membrane (parabol) and a tightly stretched sail. Wind, straw scraping the rigging, birds, trains and muffled traffic can be heard. However, the high frequencies from the dry grass and withered leaves on the trees are not audible. This creates a distance to the image, but opens up another space 'around' or perhaps in front of the image, where low frequency energy dominates. 

Photo Ellen Røed
Sound Signe Lidén

Sannerud Birch

KOMPASS, an artistic collaboration between Ellen J Røed and Signe Lidén, emerged as a separate strand in the artistic research project Image as Site at Stockholm University of the Arts. It built on an earlier phase of the research where Ellen Røed together with cinematographer and research assistant Ashley Briggs developed a dual camera rig for internal and external studies of sites. In KOMPASS, Lidén re-developed the rig for sound recording. Their collaboration also resulted in an exhibition at Trafo Kunsthall in Asker, Norway, March 12th- April 24, 2022. Rune Søchting was a conversation partner throughout the project.