“Why Are You Here?” is an audio installation created as part of the exhibition ‘Nachspielzeit’ for the rk-Gallery in Berlin Lichtenberg. The exhibition is dedicated to the question of how we see and understand our cities and neighborhoods and how we interact with them. The exhibited artistic positions deal with both the status quo and utopian potentials of urban space. The focus is also on current transformation processes and associated demands for future coexistence. Some of the works refer directly to the Fennpfuhl district of Lichtenberg, such as ‘Why Are You Here?’.

The installation is based on field recordings made in 2022 in Lichtenberg’s Fennpfuhl.

Away from the traffic noise that cuts through the individual neighborhoods of the Fennpfuhl area which divides them sonically, acoustic islands are found between the different types of prefabricated buildings.  These give the outdoor area a characteristic reverberation through the sound reflections of the smooth facades, amplify the sounds of their fellow inhabitants and carry them across the big open back yards.

Based on recorded impulse responses that acoustically remodel these reverberant spaces, the installation becomes a sonic vehicle for a composition that poetically combines recordings of the everyday of local people with recordings of different natural environments on a fictional balcony for the Fennpfuhl, providing it with new qualities for reflection and discovery.

COMPOSITION, INSTALLATION

2022

3.1 channel- audio installation
14’16” audio loop
Assistant: Tobias Hermann

09.11.2022 – 24.01.2023 rk-Galerie / Rathaus Lichtenberg (Berlin)

curated by Susanne Bosch and Georg Zolchow