For the final studio prompt of the semester, I opened up my design process. I favoured sharing and recreating experiences over producing a discrete outcomes. Therefore, even at the end (spoiler alert) when I eventually make an audio collage. The outcome I am invested in isn’t what I made, but, how I suggested a new way of being.

When I tell you the story of what happened during this prompt, I want you to keep in mind my approach. I first engaged in an embodied autoethnographic field study. Then, utilizing poetic observational techniques, I connected with the land on a somatic and spiritual level. I let my mind expand to new possibilities, taking as many turns necessary and allowing whatever to come out to come out.

Basquetball court to the west of Tim Hortons on Great Northern Way // Nature coming in moment

In Yi Fu Tuan's book "Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience" he likens space to the act of movement and place as a moment of pause. The “Basquetball Court” to the west of Tim Hortons on Great Northern Way doesn’t get much of a pause. I passed the greenspace at 10s of times before I thought to stop. Speaking to locals in the area, most people have a hard time recalling it exits. I knew this was the perfect opportunity to demonstrate my placemaking practice in action. Leveraging sound, place-based design and listening, I wanted to invite people to give a moment of pause to the greenspace.

Google Maps Image of the “Basquetball Court”.

On my first visit to the site I utilized poetic observation to creatively document the space. I find this method helps for my approach because it allows me to lower my assumptions and preconceived notions and I allow my intuition and creativity to lead.

I also wanted to bring back with me. Something tangible but not extractive. Fallen leaves became the obvious choice. Deciding which one(s) to bring was the hard part. After settling on these four leaves, I begin developing a contextual understanding of the park.

why is it there?

why does no one use it?

who owns it and what has been done to activate it for the people around?

With all these questions swirling around my head, I find it hard to pinpoint where to start.

**Top**: Leaves on the 1st day **Bottom**: Leaves on the 2nd day

Later that night, as I scrolled through the photos I took, I noticed that there were Instagram handles on the Basquetball Court’s mural. Upon using my expert sleuthing skills I discovered that Lululemon was the company that sponsored the mural.

Interesting. Going deeper,

why would be the case? To my surprise, Lululemon is the owner of the greenspace and are planning to build their new headquarters there.

That changes everything. I dug deeper,

beginning to take an interest in the history of the land.

After climbing my way out of the rabbit hole, I started to fully come to terms with the changes that False Creek Flats as an area has gone through and will keep going through if nothing changes. It used to be marshy and wetland. Indigenous people would come to catch tide, fish and collect medicinal plants. When settlement was forced upon the area, there was the decision by the colonial forces to allow the marsh to be filled and converted into an industrial hub.

With this newfound knowledge and understanding of the site,

I approached open studios the same way as I did the green space. My choice of documentation tool this time was sticky notes. If someone said something resonated with me, I wrote it down and stuck it next to the images of False Creek Flats. I kept an open mind and listened to what people were saying, not wanting to guide their comments in any direction.

After receiving the feedback, one comment that stuck with me was

“How do you get other people to feel what you are feeling?”

I knew I needed to spend more time in the greenspace listening to the land. During my second visit to the park, I recorded a Tibetan Singing Bowl performance. The singing bowl is an instrument I recently started playing and I was curious about what it would sound like in an open field. Up to this point, I only tried playing it at home. When I play with the singing bowl, I feel like I am moving waves of energy around. I become more attuned to the space by listening to the sound of the echo. I wasn’t exactly sure what this exploration would do for this assignment but it felt like the right next step. After I finished the performance, I also recorded a video of the space that captured the same vibe.

When I got back to my studio, I started gravitating towards the idea of creating an instrument. I thought creating an instrument that was site specific to the greenspace would lure people pause. I was also fascinated with the water resistant qualities of leaves. With rain being such an integral part of the lives of the people in Vancouver, I wanted try to harness that energy and work avec la nature.

I started material testing and creating prototypes of a Rain Drum.

Leave sounding tests

Despite my eagerness to create an instrument that uses the rain to play, I was meet with some hesitation by professor and cohort. Considering the prerequisites, complexity and the fine tuning it takes to create an instrument, I was asked to see if I could approach the outcome of this prompt using skills I already had available to me. I didn’t disagree with them.

It is not to say that I don’t believe in my creative abilities, but with just under two weeks before we needed to present our work, even at my best I would be hard pressed to create what I had in mind.

At this point I was forced to consider what could I do with the time I had left, with the skills I had in my availability.

I started thinking back to open studios and how I could share what I was feeling. About decay, the land, notion of progress… and then it hit me. Almost to simple. But then again, humans have the tendency to perceive even their best ideas as obvious.

Instead of bringing people to the site, I could bring the site to people. I use this is an opportunity to leverage my skills in audio production, sound design and listening rooms to recreate an experience that shares the emotions and feelings I am having about what is happening. One foot after the other in quick successions I stumble to the idea of creating an audio collage. Instead of it being purely music, I could combine the field recordings I made, with my voice to produce a hybrid soundscape that lie between a song and a podcast.

Another point of feedback came in the encouragement for me to push my artistic and the listening room practice further. Up until this point, I have only ever done listening rooms for other people’s creations, and now I was invigorated to create one for something I made.

I used transmediation to respond to the audio and video materials I collected in the park. I produced a work that cannot be claimed by any aforementioned medium but best experienced in a listening room. The work utilizes multichannel audio to spatial the sound. I also cut the video to have moments of ‘black screen’ to invite the audience to listen, not only watch.

I thought the listening room went quite well even though it didn’t go as planned. Considering the programmatic and temporal aspect of a designed experience, I signed up to show my work second after lunch break. Understanding the rhythms of my class— energies, focus and lateness— I thought going seconded after lunch would be optimal.

What I didn’t foresee was the technical difficulties that came. I needed at least 30-45 minutes to properly set up the room, to account for troubleshooting that is bound to happen. I could have communicated more to my cohort and professors of the time and space I needed, but nonetheless, I tried to work with the time I was given. After kicking everyone out and changing the classroom as fast as I could, when it was time to press play, the sound didn’t work.

What felt like an eternity to fix, I finally got the sound to work and ambient visuals playing. From their the listening room had a great response and people enjoyed avant-garde approach to creation and how I facilitated an aura in the room. Some classmates appreciated seeing me set up the room while they were waiting and couldn’t tell whether it was part of the listening room. Meta-Listening Room???

One thing I could have leveraged better was the support of the people in attendance of the listening room. I felt that I needed to do everything myself and create the mystique about what was happening but I think it could also be interesting if their was more crowd participation. For example, people gravitated towards was the burning of incense. They connected the scent to rituals (church) and was the first thing people noticed when they entered. One of my classmates was eager to light it themselves and I felt bad for not being more open to that in the moment.

Going forward I want to be more attuned to my role as a host and harness the energies that are being provided. For example, I could “gave” the role of incense lighter to that person. Another person could help me play music and maybe if someone in the room was into mediation, they could lead a short circle for us. Going forward I want to see how I can keep “mistakes” and serendipity in the presentation of a listening room while still creating an immersive experience. Lastly, I want to keep open to the participatory potential that listening room have.

False Creek Flats /// Decay (Progress)

Design for the senses