L’ discovered: Braunschweig’s sound sites

These days various international artists create sound art in Braunschweig. Works that merge art and sounds. Sound art is an intermedial art form. It is an interplay of sound, of space, of time and of movement. Sounds, noises, everything is connected with other media.

Brunswick. A few meters from the center you will find the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Platz. Junction and seat of the Landesbank. Just a stone’s throw away, Bruchstraße, the centre of the red light district. “Between whorehouse and monastery” is the title of this year’s international sound art in Braunschweig. It takes you from the Gothic Ägidienkirche to the historic half-timbered houses on Bruchstraße.

Impressive but also minimalist, the artists express themselves in a confrontational way as well as barely perceptible: Like a pharmacy in the courtyard herb garden. Circularly laid out, surrounded by high red walls. Lush green herbs stand in the middle. Close to the walls one sees three large metal ventilation shafts protruding from the ground.

Ventilation shafts in the backyard

In the backyard of a city pharmacy you do not expect much impressive. But then you are impressed when you discover a wonderfully tended herb garden. More or less garnished with art. Cold steel, ventilation shafts, typical image of any apartment block.

Heiko Wommelsdorf’s installation alludes to the many backyards of the quarter, the large air-conditioning units and vents behind the facades of the streets, between the whorehouse and the monastery, from Friedrich-Wilhelmplatz to the herb garden courtyard of this city pharmacy. From the ventilation shafts of the installation, recordings of ventilation shafts can be heard again, simple but effective. At the same time they have been changed in pitch, a triad is created, a chord is heard. Almost like the sound of the sea, one now stands in the hidden courtyard, between herbs and high walls.

Passing a net of hundreds of paper leaves, high up in the trees and a snoring fountain, you come to the Ägidienkirche. In it Phillip Kullen realizes one of the most interesting and impulsive works. The Berlin artist calls his contribution to this year’s klangstaetten simply: “Sound installation with two gongs”.

Golden gongs in the church

An impressive church, columns as high as five or six stories. The tops fold into domes. White-grey stone. A few steps to the center, past a small sea of flowers around a statue of the Virgin Mary, you see it, the gong. There is this huge golden gong enthroned at the end of the hall, hidden between ornate white columns ten metres above the ground.

The perception of sounds and vibrations as a way to explore space, time and spirit is the central theme of this work for klangstetten 2012.

The artist, musician and composer Phillip Kullen studied in Cuba, New York, Spain and Brazil. Since 2009, the Berlin graduate has been exploring the creative use of sound and space at the UdK Berlin. His installation in the Aegidienkirche works with two gongs facing each other. Both as high as a human being. An impulse of surging waves causes the gong to vibrate without being struck. The gong develops special overtones in addition to its meditative, bassy basic sound. The closer you get to the front of the church, the more you feel the vibrations of the tones. One lingers, automatically. Captivated by the vibrating bass. In this huge gothic church you can feel how the sound spreads out, how it arises and fades away again.

Already in early Asia, 2000 before Christ, gongs were sacred. Their production was so elaborate that they had to be beaten up to 150 times and put back into the fire. It is an art to make them as well as to play them here in the church. Meditatively it creates a feeling like being in the here and now. Past and future play no role for a moment.

Sound art weeks

Besides the permanent installations, workshops are offered, lectures but also guided tours like the Heartbreakers Reunion Tour. Inspired by the appearance of the Walkman, the wearing of headphones in urban areas, Damian Regbetz developed the tour. In small groups and with synchronized Mp3 players, the tour goes through the winding alleys of the neighborhood.

Who wants to create an overview can do this from Friday. In Braunschweig’s General Konsumverein, meeting place for artists is the exhibition opening of “Sound, Art, School”. Various student works are shown, which were created at different schools with the artists. The Braunschweig Klangstaetten 2012, a small world, a few meters from the center, just a stone’s throw away from the Landesbank.