CLIENT: vision.ruhr, Dortmund
2000

An interactive sound architecture to the plans of old sun dials: Echo-cascade for the production of sounds of subterranean vibrations and their optimum atomisation in higher layers of air.

Although sun dials of all sizes have existed for ages, the attempt to build a moon clock has not been made for quite a long time. A moon clock is an invisible machine. Its effects are only audible. The lunar powers of tide do not only influence the sea but also the different layers of rocks. Deep sound vibrations come up daily in different rising and falling cycles. A sound-based moon-clock makes those huge subterranean sound waves audible and brings them to the surface.

Four sound stones are set up immediately above ground with a distance of 25 metres from each other. They form the sound foundation for an echo-cascade rising up to 20m. This leads the sound movement of the deep sound vibrations along an alley and far beyond its tree tops. Six see-through sound transformers are hung up in the branches so as to enable every gust of wind to optimally blow away the sounds.

The layers of air themselves are naturally filled with huge deep sound fields that, however, are inaudible to us. A moon-clock thus is a space where different adjacent layers of space can be brought into a relationship as if we could read the night time by listening to the moon shades. Admittedly, without the magic of poesy, the light of day does not allow any moonlight to be seen. However, the sound areas cycling in the alley that can be diverted by the visitors with the help of four motion sensors, do provide such an impression.