interactive sound installation with hairdryers, contact microphones, dimmer, light desk, computer with MAX/MSP
Five hairdryers hang on their cables from the ceiling. There is about 1m distance between each other. Opposite from each hairdryer on
the wall there is a contact microphone on a round wooden board. In front of the installation stands a desk with five faders with which
the public can steplessly turn on and off the hairdryers. On the right and on the left as well as behind the installation stand altogether
four loudspeakers.
When you turn on a hairdryer it starts to make circular movements. As soon as you turn on several hairdryers they start to
oscillate against each other. The air of the hairdryers bangs the contact microphones against the wall and gets their membrane
swinging. This movement triggers percussive sounds which come out of the loudspeakers.
The sounds out of the loudspeakers are generated from sampled hairdryer noise. A recorded hairdryer sound is split in singular grains and played in a certain rhythm. Like that each hairdryer has its own sound character. When a contact microphone bangs against the wall it gives a signal to the computer: For three seconds you hear percussive sound which is blown away from the installation by wandering backward through the loundspeakers. The more the contact microphones bang against the wall in succession the denser gets the rhythmical structure of the individual sounds. If the air masses calm down the rhythm of the sounds slows down as well.
© Lilian Beidler 2019