Atmosphéries and the poetics of the in situ: the role and impact of sensors in data-to-sound transposition installations
Anne Despond, Nicolas Reeves, Vincent Cusson · 2021
Atmosphéries is a research-creation program which produced a series of art installations originally called “Cloud Harps”, that has known multiple transformations since their first instantiation in 1997. They are made of sculptural wooden “buffets” integrating different sensors that probe the sky and the surroundings to collect various atmospheric data. An internal process tuned by a human composer then maps these data to different audio parameters from a custom-made synthesis environment to create continuous sound and musical sequences. The present paper addresses conceptual and technological considerations about real-time sensing of clouds in a sonic-artistic installation context. Particular attention is given to the limitations and artefacts produced by such specialized sensors, and how those can be embraced to remain consistent with the spatio-temporal aspects of in situ works.