Animal roar: Bernie Krause's carnal orchestra at Fondation Cartier, Paris
Conductor, long-time musician and recording engineer Bernie Krause presents a new exhibition and sound installation at Fondation Cartier in Paris. With 'The Great Animal Orchestra', his scientific work is repositioned within an artistic construct. Pictured: installation view.
If the accepted definition of an orchestra is an ensemble of musicians playing a variety of instruments, a new exhibition at the Fondation Cartier makes the case that animals in their natural habitats are an orchestra of the purest form. Its conductor – or perhaps more accurately, its conduit – is Bernie Krause, a long-time musician, recording engineer and producer who has been collecting and archiving the sounds of creatures in the wild since 1968. As a pioneer in soundscape ecology, he is credited with the notion of a ‘biophony’ or ‘niche hypothesis’ – the collective sound produced by animals carving out their particular acoustic niche in a given environment.
EXCLUSIVE: listen to Krause’s recording from Mungwezi Ranch, Gonarezhou National Park, Zimbabwe
With 'The Great Animal Orchestra', which also happens to be the name of his recently published book, Krause's scientific work is positioned within a more artistic (but no less relevant) construct. The exhibition gathers together a diverse group of artists (Cai Guo-Qiang, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Adriana Varejão and Agnès Varda, among others) who have created works from these soundscapes. But Krause’s recordings are the main attraction, in part because the 77-year-old’s selection of audio segments have been married to dynamic visual sequences commissioned by the Fondation Cartier and executed by London-based creative studio, United Visual Artists.
The installation can be found in the building’s darkened lower level, where his biophanies from North America, the Amazon, the Dzanga-Sangha Reserve in the Central African Republic and the oceans are optimised as an immersive experience far removed from the source material. Here, the unintended music of crows, Eastern wolves, blue jays and squirrels from Algonquin Park, Canada – as one example – appears as both a graphic of flashing red light and a streaming projection of digital information interpreted from a spectrogram. Along with a shallow reflecting pool, which translates the deepest sounds as rippling water, the combined visuals translate frequency, intensity, duration and possibly even communication in an evocative way. Without any images of animals, the effect becomes one of comparison. The clicking noises from a whale might conjure up an MRI machine; the howling wolves sound like sirens; chirping cicadas might have inspired electronic dance music. Then comes the irony that these comparisons reinforce an anthropocentric view – as humans, we’re often just mimicking the natural world.
Despite the fact that the animals are communicating freely without any direction, Krause refers to the 12-minute recordings as ‘compositions’, since they exist within a timeframe. Further, he notes how these limited critter voices have 'evolved to find their acoustic niche where there is enough bandwidth to express themselves to both transmit and receive information in a way that's going to support their existence'. The streaming spectrograms, he says, makes this clear.
When asked whether the digital depictions – both recordings and visuals – take us deeper into nature or suggest an abstracted experience, Krause’s straightforward reply is both. ‘It has its origin in the natural world. But it's obviously an illusion, because what's taken from Algonquin Park is now in Paris. And that's a bit of a stretch,’ he tells Wallpaper*.
But within the abstractions is a sobering truth: these sumptuous biophonies are changing as habitats become increasingly threatened – or, in extreme cases, no longer exist. Biodiversity is diminishing but also, as he observed from birds near his home 80km north of San Francisco, their sounds are no longer the same. This makes his recordings (currently obtained using a portable Sound Devices 722 or 744 recorder and Sennheiser MKH microphones) even more valuable, and why visiting cities can feel so enervating. ‘I hear the wild critters that live in a city struggling for purchase. And in the natural world, that's not the case,’ he explains. ‘They all have to find their niche again, whether it's a physical niche or an acoustic one.’
INFORMATION
’The Great Animal Orchestra’ is on view until 8 January 2017. For more information, visit the Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain website
Photography courtesy Lumento
Wallpaper* Newsletter
Receive our daily digest of inspiration, escapism and design stories from around the world direct to your inbox
ADDRESS
Fondation Cartier
261 Boulevard Raspail
Paris, 75014
-
Palazzo Roma embodies the heritage of Roman noblesse
Palazzo Roma, part of the Shedir Collection, boasts eclectic and eccentric interiors by Giampiero Panepinto
By Luke Abrahams Published
-
Boise Passive House’s bold gestures support an environmentally friendly design
Boise Passive House by Haas Architecture combines sleek, contemporary design and environmental efficiency
By Ellie Stathaki Published
-
Tour the Morgan Motor Company’s Worcestershire factory
The Morgan Motor Company might seem timeless – or even dated – but underneath the handcrafted aluminium bodywork is a manufacturer with great skills and grand plans: we take a factory tour
By Jonathan Bell Published
-
Josèfa Ntjam reveals mythical sculptures for her LVMH Métiers d’Art artist residency
LVMH Métiers d’Art presents ‘Une cosmogonie d’océans’, celebrating Josèfa Ntjam’s artistic residence
By Tianna Williams Published
-
Secret 7” is back with limited-edition vinyl cover art to aid War Child
Secret 7” returns with it charity auction of seven new mystery tracks sealed behind 700 uniquely designed vinyl cover sleeves (and anyone can bid)
By Tianna Williams Published
-
How Oscar-nominated ‘Anatomy of a Fall’ made a star of the most ear-popping song of the year
Wallpaper* meets ‘Anatomy of a Fall’ favourites Bacao Rhythm & Steel Band, whose cover of 50 Cent's ‘P.I.M.P’ muscles its way into the Oscar-nominated courtroom drama
By Craig McLean Published
-
Damien Hirst takes over Château La Coste
Damien Hirst’s ‘The Light That Shines’ at Château La Coste includes new and existing work, and takes over the entire 500-acre estate in Provence
By Hannah Silver Published
-
Ludovic Nkoth’s vibrant paintings reflect on migration
Cameroon-born, New York-based Ludovic Nkoth uses acrylic paint to strike a balance between abstraction and figuration
By Ugonna-Ora Owoh Published
-
Heads up: art exhibitions to see in January 2024
Start the year right with the Wallpaper* pick of art exhibitions to see in January 2024
By Hannah Silver Published
-
Tia-Thuy Nguyen encases Chateau La Coste oak tree in tonne of stainless steel strips
Tia-Thuy Nguyen’s ‘Flower of Life’ lives in the grounds of sculpture park and organic winery Château La Coste in France
By Harriet Quick Published
-
Paris Photo 2023: Eva Nielsen puts our impact on the Camargue in dynamic focus
At Paris Photo 2023, ‘Insolare’ by Eva Nielsen, in collaboration with BMW Art Makers, is a compelling exploration of human impact on the landscape
By Sophie Gladstone Published