FLAT EARTH FOLDED
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Flat Earth Folded is a sculptural installation that uses transducers to activate various materials as speakers. The exhibition is both site and sense-specific. Thompson and Pond are interested in how the perception of the physical size and movement of sound defines the space around us. The arrangement of objects and sound in the work creates a reframing and re-describing of our temporal and spatial experience.  A sonic transducer is a loudspeaker without a cone. It transforms the material to which it is attached into the device that conveys pulses of energy into audible sound.

In Mark Rothko’s Works On Paper or Unpublished notebook he states: "The scale conception involves the relationship of objects to their surroundings -- the emphasis of things or space...It definitely involves a space emotion. A child may limit space arbitrarily and then heroify his objects. Or he may infinitize space, dwarfing the importance of objects. causing them to merge and become part of the space of the world."  

In an age that produces an ever-increasing amount of recorded artifacts, sound is increasingly experienced as compressed, filtered and lossy data through an abundant variety of mediums, rendering the source nearly meaningless at times. Flat Earth Folded is a response to this subjugation of sound. It explores the conceived relationship between space and object by utilizing sound as witness and the primary agent of inquiry of physical space. This approach is both ancient and modern. Electronic media and computer music programming are combined with an experience of sound that is defined by the material and spatial arrangement of the landscape constructed within the gallery. Prior to the introduction of electronic and recorded music, the experience of sound was contingent upon a broader range of environment factors defined by space, time, and materials.

“Music is liquid architecture; Architecture is frozen music.” – Johan Wolfgang Von Goethe

Flat Earth Folded is the fifth collaborative installation for Thomspon and Pond.