Transient Frequencies (2002)

All artists are invited to consider the following qualities of Federation Square in the conception and development of proposals for permanent or ephemeral works:

1. The experiential, sensory, kinaesthetic and temporal qualities of the site
2. Relationships between technology, media and the production of culture
3. Qualities of flow and emergence across the site
4. The public nature of the site and the negotiation of different audiences
5. Relationships to key tenants at the Square and their audiences "

Architecture After Geometry written by Peter Davidson and Donald Bates, was my initial departure point in forming the basis of my proposal for Transient Frequencies. Following this lead into architectural spatial meaning I sort to augment that meaning through site-specific sound design and composition.

My key statement was:

"The Federation Square development incorporates the complex issues of navigation within the structures of design, bringing a myriad of differing elements into the one coherent architectural form. This heterogeneous approach is where I consider sound to be able to play a key role."

I developed the Transient Frequencies concept further, initiating Federation Square's Arts Programmer, Vanessa Walker to describe the project in this way: "Transient Frequencies is an interactive sound environment, which reconfigures the invisible dynamics of the city in a harmonic interplay of random, recorded, and real sounds. The presence and movement of the listener is required to produce this sonic experience. By navigating the space in particular ways, each visitor stimulates the electro-acoustic environment causing changes in perceived scale, frequency and modulation.

Consequently, each visitor has a unique journey. Transient Frequencies punctuates the journey to and from Federation Square. It does not merely fill a sonic void or cover over unpleasant acoustic conditions. Instead it blurs perceptual boundaries and challenges our expectations of ordinary, everyday experience. As visitors leave the comfort of their cars, they are not immediately conscious of anything unusual, but gradually they become aware of their sonic environment and the effects of their own movements - they hear strange, familiar, unexpected, unrecognisable sounds, their source ambiguous. There is a sense of transition, of anticipation...

The site is a three-story car park building situated to the east of the Museum of Australian Art building at Federation Square. It is a key site, representing a zone of transition, a site of arrival and departure, a 'non-place'. Transient Frequencies is composed as a spatial arrangement of 'found' urban sounds that have been recorded, digitally manipulated and then re-introduced into the spatial order and random acoustics of the car park.

The work is configured as a multiple speaker arrangement with individual speakers located in different areas of the car park. Speakers emit a series of sounds of short duration. This sonic material is stored on digital hard disc units and is 'controlled' by a custom designed software program that directs the sonic output in response to information received from movement sensors located in the space."

Transient Frequencies' equipment design

The system is based around a number of discreet samples that are stored digitally on six sound-stores connected to six amplifiers, six speakers and six infrared movement detectors. These are all controlled by a number of macro controllers that allow the system to be randomised as follows:

1. The number of samples played after triggering (between 1 & 3).
2. The speaker location that each sample is delivered from.
3. Selection of varying preset volume levels of each sample.
4. The time taken before a triggered sample is played.
5. The time between each sample.
6. The time before a new sequence is activated again.

The sequence

The infrared movement sensors (or triggers) are located at each speaker location. The trigger's function is to activate the sound store when a visitor is within the triggers range. Once triggered:

1. A random sequence of between 1 and 3 samples are chosen (each sample can have 2 or 4 volume variations that are also randomly selected)
2. The time before they are played is then chosen (random, between 1 and five seconds).
3. The speaker location is randomly chosen.
4. The sample(s) is then played from the chosen speaker location, with a random

Artist

• Priestly, Carl

Site

• Federation Square