[sdiy] Listening and recording electromagnetic fields

[Olav Martin Kvern]

Colleagues,

There was a quite cool piece built around something like this at the 1986 International Computer Music Conference in The Hague (although it might have been at the Symposium on Interactive Composition at STEIM in Amsterdam, the week before--my memory is hazy). The piece occupied a series of more-or-less silent rooms--as I recall, you'd put on headphones that were equipped with EM field "listeners" and wander around, listening to EM from power cords and the wall circuits.

There may also have been recorded sound running through the power lines--it was a bit hard to tell what, exactly, one was hearing. At the time, at least, I thought this was part of the charm of the piece.:-)

I have the feeling that someone on the list might have created this installation--if so, please correct me if I've gotten something wrong.

Thanks,

Ole