Dissemination (2010)
«Dissemination» is a collaborative audio-visual installation by Hanns Holger Rutz and Nayari Castillo, in which both media create a space by relying on and reflecting upon each other. It consists of horizontally and vertically suspended glass panels functioning both as a body for sound resonance and diffusion as well as specimen holders carrying petri dishes filled with seeds. Several homogenous and clearly separated tableaux are generated which unwind the temporal development of the generative sound composition in space. Flying seeds, which due to their natural features can be dispersed by wind, symbolize motion, traveling and migration. The act of dissemination is an act of re-writing, leaving traces, producing movement instead of a fulfillment, strategy instead of finality.
Berlin and Graz
The work has been exhibited successively in Berlin and Graz, where the spaces were quite different, resulting in two very distinctive variations. While the space in Berlin was a small dark room which we used in a museal chamber manner—distributing the plates along three walls—the gallery in Graz had a large long room with a complete window front, reflecting our original idea of having massive coloured daylight coming in.
Corresponding with the dim light in Berlin, the sound was played at a quite low level, requiring the audience to be standing still to capture the details. In Graz, the number of sounding plates was extended, some adjustments were made to the algorithms and a few new sounds appeared. Along with the much brighter and airy situation—the plates were placed in the middle of the room and allowed the audience to move freely around them from all sides—we decided to raise the sound level as well.
In the following recordings the contrast between the open large acoustics of the Graz space (first half of the file) and the more hermetic and intimate acoustics in Berlin (second half of the file) is striking:
Dissemination (room rec.; use headphones at low volume)
