Polyrhythmia

Polyrhythmia: Turning movement into sound with GPS, iPhones and Arduino

Small machines perch in the structure of the building, tapping out rhythms on pipes, beams, floors and walls. These machines are controlled by an iPhone app and as people travel around the city the speed of their movement brings the tapping machines to life, playing the infrastructure of the building. As they navigate the city they pay attention to their speed of travel and imagine their movement calling out a tapped rhythm in the gallery, its sonic voice contributing to this temporal symphony of the city.

The original installation was created by Jen at a Pervasive Media Lab residency.  My role was to take the initial system and add 3 more of the Tapping machines that operated in a different way.  I also built a suite of tools in Processing so that Jen could test the system remotely and record and playback walks.

tickerWalkPlayer4 from gigzine on Vimeo.

Hopeful Monster Exhibition Documentation from Jen Southern on Vimeo.

Link to good blog post on original project