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 Sonic
Boardwalk
by Kristi
Allik/Robert Mulder
on the west end of the boardwalk on Centre Island
opens June 27, 2008
runs 24/7 June 27-Oct 1
Sonic Boardwalk, by Robert
Mulder and Kristi Allik, is a sound installation located on the Ward
Island boardwalk that generates a microsound landscape activated by the
kinetic imprint of passing visitors.
Resonating Bodies, Bumble Room
by Sarah Peebles
audio material, audio programming; overall
concept, facilitation
Rob King
visual programming, data gathering and projection
Anne Barros
electroformed copper offering plate with
micro-controlled heating elements (collaboration) and silver bowl;
Rob Cruickshank
technical assistance, live video, ultraviolet
video/tech development, technical and artistic consultant
*new* gallery, 906 Queen W.,
Toronto (corner of Crawford and Queen W.)
July 4-27, 2008
Opening Reception Saturday July 12th 4-6pm at *new* gallery
Followed by "The forgotten Pollinators" talk by Dr. Stephen L Buchmann
at InterAccess 9 Ossington Avenue, 7pm.
 "Resonating Bodies" is a series of mixed media
installations and community outreach projects which focuses on
biodiversity of pollinators indigenous to the natural and urban
ecosystems of the Greater Toronto Area. Conceived by Sarah Peebles with
Rob King, Rob Cruickshank and Anne Barros, the installations illuminate
aspects of local biodiversity such as bumblebee colonies and their
foraging activities, ultraviolet bee vision, pollinator/plant
co-evolution, solitary bee and wasp nesting life/life cycles, and
colour-coded DNA barcodes (a novel new technique for species
identification pioneered by Canadian researchers). Resonating Bodies
coincides with the release of Toronto’s first guide to native bees,
“Bees of Toronto”, by Laurence Packer, Professor of Biology at York
University (published by the David Suzuki Foundation). The theme of the
booklet — some 23 genera of bees found in Toronto — is woven into the
fabric of the project on several levels, with talks on related topics
by collaborating researchers Laurence Packer, Jessamyn Manson, Peter
Hallett and Stephen Buchman.
The two installments of the
project, "Bumble Domicile" (2008) and Nest Wall (2009), highlight
distinct features of bumble bees (which are social) and of solitary
bees and wasps through observation of the physical world, visual and
audio transformations, scent, touch and genetic and other biological
information. "Bumble Domicile" weaves observation of an on-site bumble
bee hive containing live video and audio of its internal activity with
the hive’s pollen-collecting activity, and, real-time ultraviolet video
of flowering plants in the building’s communal garden adjacent to the
gallery. Portions of the garden are being cultivated and tended
especially for the installation by the building’s tenant-gardeners and
neighborhood youth involved in the CARE and Art in the Park programmes
at Trinity Bellwoods (*new* gallery is located within the 900 Queen
West Artscape artist tenant building). The pollen-gathering activities
of our bumble bees will be the focus of two cameras observing the hive.
By routinely painting the stamens of a variety of plants in the
adjacent garden with flourescent dye powders and by tracking their
pollen collection via the cameras, data gathered over time will trigger
the growth of virtual plants projected within the gallery space and
will visually reflect the changes within the hive as a whole. Real-time
(live) ultraviolet display of our bumble bees foraging upon flowering
plants in the garden will be projected separately using an adapted
video camera which has been modified and fitted with a UV filter. This
will reveal petal markings visible only in ultraviolet light, known to
function as pollen guides for bees and other pollinating insects
(markings invisible to the human eye, but visible to bees and other
insects).
Continuous audio
transformations of pre-recorded bees and shoh (the Japanese
mouth-organ, an instrument which has utilized beeswax since ancient
times) and headphones which “plug” into the actual hive bring together
sight and sound. Visitors are invited to place aromatic offerings of
beeswax and pine resin - materials utilized within beehives and
solitary nests - into a heated copper tray which resembles the interior
of our hive, and which has been created through a unique process
involving the remnants of a discarded bumble bee hive.
Free bee trading cards feature
macro photography of bee anatomy, life facts and colour-coded DNA
barcodes of some local bumble bee species, and will be on-hand with
copies of the “Bees of Toronto” booklet. Both art object and
educational item, these cards are the first in a series of trading
cards of pollinators featured in Resonating Bodies at both *new*
gallery and at our bee-wasp condo at the Franklin Children’s Garden on
Toronto Island, our data gathering site for “Nest Wall” (2009).
at St Andrew by-the-Lake Church, Toronto Island
July 27- August 30, 2008 (Sundays only except for August 30) 2-6pm
 Wish You
Were Here
by Jennifer Schmidt,
Colin Asquith, and Terry Nauheim
A site for interactivity and
reception, "Wish You Were Here" is a collective soundscape of audio
greeting cards intended to be experienced within the hands of visitors
through physical and aural sampling. Our sounds are of field
recordings, fragmented and manipulated to reinterpret the conventional
notion of a sentiment and sense of place in the model of a greeting
card. Re-contextualizing recorded material within this format places
limits— including time, compression, and availability—while initiating
an accessible, portable, and participatory narrative.
Visitors are able to browse
and select cards, to then open and play, by interacting with the card
display racks within the installation. Systems of exchange become
evident through the selective re-authoring and re-playing of these
sounds, quoting a theoretical giver and receiver-- absent and present.
Through the opening and closing of cards on display, the gesture of a
greeting becomes amplified, defining a space that is, at once, personal
and public, intuitive and mechanical.
 Sound Travels Documents (10th
Anniversary edition)
by Stefan Rose
This 10th anniversary Sound
Travels Documents exhibit traces the history of the Sound Travels
festival on Toronto Island through photos and sound recordings.
Sonic Portrait Listening Gallery
curated by Darren
Copeland
Travel the world soundscape
through the imaginations of sound artists from around the world. A
selection of sonic portraits of cities from around the world will be
available for your listening edification.
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relation to mobility and the
relation to the “other”. Le vivant bruit du corps is based on a radio
art piece called Tanz which attempted to relate the state of dance
through the medium of text and the sound on the levels of physics
(gravity, acceleration,…), physiology (different body systems), of
space (volume and movement) then relationships (interaction between
dancers). While conserving the concerns approached in Tanz, Le vivant
bruit du corps invests another medium. With this new approach, an
immersive interactive sound installation, the listener is no longer
kept captive in the box that is the radio receiver. S/he inhabits the
physical space of sound. S/he moves in the three dimensions modifying
the sound composition with her/his presence.
