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Superorganism: Listening to the Anthropocene

Date

2021

Authors

Sarah Barns, Studio ESEM

Project type

Design, installation

Location

Eora (Sydney), Australia

A bespoke sound and light installation Superorganism invites audiences to consider their place within complex ecosystems of life, spanning human and more-than-human life forms in a space of shared listening.

Lie back, look up, and listen in to past, present and imagined future sounds of our fragile planetary ecosystems.
Informed by the ideas of James Lovelock, creator of the Gaia hypothesis and author of Novacene, Superorganism resonates with different soundings of complex ecosystems; from natural to artificial, from historical bird songs to electro-synthesis and machine intelligence.

It offers a space of meditation on the nature of grief, of hope, and of collective intelligence being forged through shared recording, augmenting and digitising our spaces of shared communication.

Taking place at a pivotal point in the history of our planet, during an era of mass extinction and loss of biodiversity, Superorganism invites audiences to reflect, under the canopy of the tree, on what we are losing, what we gain by paying attention, and what uncertain futures lie ahead.

With thanks to the following field recordists for permission to use recordings in this piece: Andrew Skeoch, Vicky Powys, George Vlad (UK). Acknowledgement to the State Library of Western Australia for use of John Hutchinson's 1980 field recordings of the Daintree Rainforest.

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