Panta Rhei

This public kinetic light and sound installation was commissioned by artichoke arts organisation, County Durham Council and Arts Council England. The work was derived from working with choral practices across the North East resulted in a five-channel soundscape with twenty moving head beams, creating a corridor of moving light across the 70 meter space of Prebends bridge which sits down from Durham cathedral. The aim of the work was to speak to foster an experience that speaks to the qualities of sacredness and profundity in line with artichokes mission to create “events that live in the memory forever”

The practice-based research focus was on participatory workshopping which was used with local multiple choirs, professional and community, to build a soundscape for a kinetic light and sound installation, produced by Artichoke for County Durham’s Lumiere festival. The work had two objectives; the first was to create a framework for production which facilitated using differing abilities and styles of choral practice, from multiple sessions, within the same artwork; resulting in a harmonious whole that gave ownership to its participants. The second was to work with heritage sites that act as liminal spaces, utilising new techniques of A/V control, within installation, to produce experiences which spoke to the numinous heritage of the area and create unique numinous experiences in that process. In the case of Lumiere the space was Prebends bridge; a grade 1 listed structure made in 1770 and part of Durham Cathedrals estate. The work utilised custom software to allow for DMX (a protocol for controlling lights) to be used in a process which was more intuitive to animation/editing controls; removing specialist knowledge barriers to operation. Custom controllers were used to operate 10 moving head lights, three floodlights and a five channel soundscape all if which were tailored to the experience of the space.