MoKS was the co-producer of Tuned City Tallinn along with Dock e.V. of Berlin. We want to thanks everyone for their help, participation and support for making this an unforgettable event. Below are a series of galleries showing just a few of the highlights of the event between July 4th and 10th, 2011. Tuned City Tallinn was part of the official program of Tallinn 2011 European Capital of Culture.
Gallery #1
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Gallery #2
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For the second year MoKS has hosted the 'summer practice' for students from Tartu Art College sculpture department. The aim is to allow students to experiment and gain practical experience in a non-school setting. The weeks activities were guided by John and Evelyn who led a series of exercises that focused on the idea of site-specific environmental art. Using the greater context of Mooste village and its surroundings, the students were also given time to develop their own works. They also had a chance to learn about the practices of other artists who were in the residency at MoKS and to get a historical overview of site-specific art practices from historian Maarin Ektermann. Despite the changing weather conditions, it was a productive week overall and we hope to host another group of creative people next year.
Special thanks to Veljo Runnel for leading an excellent workshop on Nature Sound Recording, sharing his experiences from the last 10 years and extensive knowledge on bird species. We enjoyed having Danny, Evelyn, Eve, Taavi, Patrick, John, Ignaz, Maria and Aivo to come out and participate. The group spent one early morning and one full evening out in the field, analyzing and collecting sounds. We then listened to the recordings that were made an identified the animal species that were heard. Comparisons of different recording setups were helpful to in defining both aesthetic and scientific approaches to the sounds that were captured.
Recording nature sounds
This is a list of problems and challenges experienced by the participants during the workshop. Overcoming these issues are key to improving your skills
- the sound of ones self -whispering, rustling clothes and hungry stomachs can easily show up in your recording interfere with your interest to capture natural sounds.
- to plan or not to plan -research is important but sometimes random situations can also bring success. how much planning is needed?
- finding a good location -certain factors like flora and fauna types, distance from inhabited areas, proximity to lakes and rivers all contribute to the wildlife you may find in nature and the sounds they make
- knowledge of equipment -for getting good recordings, everything depends on your technical setup. knowing what types of microphones work best for certain situations, charging batteries and maintaining your equipment is essential in being prepared to capture the right moment.
- consider the whole sonic environment -noises from other creatures like insects and dogs can interfere with what you want to record. birds often change their position, a robin sitting in from of your microphone will mask more distant sounds. learn some tricks on how to deal with these situations.
- patience and persistence is key -finding interesting subjects to record rarely happens easily. sometimes you may need to follow a sound source carefully to get close to it, yet often in the process animals can easily be scared by your presence
- coordinate when recording in a group -make sure agreements are made about when to be quiet, how long you plan to record, and when movements can be made. not considering these details will often cause unwanted noises in your recordings.
- be prepared personally -bring food to feed a hungry stomach. wear the right clothing for recording, sitting still may need extra layers for warmth. get into the right mental state for listening carefully, recording sounds in nature demands your full attention.
- familiarity with the subject -start to learn about animal species and the types of sounds they make. in noisy environments (morning bird chorus) it can be difficult to distinguish one bird call from another
- laziness -its hard to get out in the field. forget the excuses, get off your bum and get out to record
*image* identifying the species heard during the morning chorus
Future goals
What do the participants aim for in their future practices?
- learn about animal identification -some understanding of species differentiation is helpful and needed when you want to search for special sounds. This also helps in understanding the environment you are in and your relation to it.
- learn and consider the geographical aspects of the environments where you plan to record -think about the acoustic properties of natural habitats. not every forest sounds the same, what environments are interesting for capturing a good soundscape
- improve recording technique -invest in some better equipment (mics/recorder) and making regular use of it
- make time to record -preparation and travel add extra time, making the whole process rather lengthy
- be more conscious of surroundings -you can't hear nature if you're not listening to it
- find a creative response to nature sounds -can the recorded sounds be used in a dance/movement piece for example.
- edit, clean and archive the recordings -it is easy to forget what and where you recorded
- cooperate with other field recordists -it helps to share knowledge and techniques. plan more regular excursions.
- reach out to the public -look for ways to share your recordings and build a wider audience. see how nature sound recording can be more than a hobby.
listen to a mix of four recordings by John Grzinich 1. creaking tree and morning birds by the Ahja river 2. lone Tangmalm's Owl (Karvasjalg kakk) in the forest 3. Spotted Crake (Täpikhuik) 4. Morning chorus near Ahunapalu with Cranes
We've had some busy weekends at MoKS lately. This past weekend was no exception (April 30-May 1). One of the ongoing projects building up to the Tuned City Tallinn event this July, is the Sound Map of Tallinn. Following the first phase of the project, which was to collect data on sonic landmarks, common sounds and unique sonic effects, that can be heard throughout the city. This was done in cooperation with anthropology students from Tallinn University, taking part in the "Soundscapes, perception and design" course offered by Carlo Cubero this past spring.
Following this research phase we are entering the period where we need to visualize the data, that is, translate it into a visual form in order to graphically lay out the information for the printed form. Carsten Stabenow and Andreas Töpfer will be designing and editing the final design of the map, but in order to do so we needed to brainstorm what a printed sound map could look like and edit some of the data collected and shape it into a usable form.
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See the Tallinn Sound Diaries by Andreas Töpfer.
Maarin Ektermann (Murky) made and interview with Evelyn and John regarding 10 years of activities at MoKS.
"Lokaalne ja globaalne MoKS" for SIRP (Eesti keeles)
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GROUND is an exchange project between MoKS, MAA Art school of Helsinki and the Art Academy of Poznan in Poland funded by Grundtvig life long learning programme. GROUND as a project focuses on Strategies of Culture, Collaborative Methods and Site-Specific practices. During a 2 year period, groups from each of the partners will make 2 visits to each other partner. The local host develops a theme and a program for each meeting. In the case of this first meeting the theme was "environment" and the students were given an open canvas as how to interpret that.
Two options were given as starting points:
- choose and "environment. make and analysis of it. work with the phenomenon of that environment
- create an "environment"
Over the week the students formed into small collaborative groups or worked as individuals and developed site-specific installations, performances or multi-media works. From the Estonian side we had: Mari, Patrick, Kersti, Kerstin and Indrek.
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