t- ihos*: Sonically visible city through the participative planning of experimental models
2008, urban soundscape exploration
*T – ihos: Pun from the greek words “Toihos” which means “wall” and “ihos” which means “sound”Athen-s
Let’s imagine for a while that in reality Athens is not one but five cities overlapping each other, five Athens suspending, each one in a different dimension. The first one is made up of all the images that constitute Athens as we know it, the second one of all the sounds, the third one of all the scents, etc. Let’s also imagine that we, being its habitants or visitors, have the ability to experience them all at the same time and create one single aesthesis as if they were only one. At any given moment we can conceive an entirely different mixture, depending on the senses on which we concentrate. Some of these Athens we know well, some others we don’t. Most people can draw a quick map quite easily, part of the first Athens, the visual one. But how well can one draw a map of the sonic one?
The noise of coexistence
The noise cannot exist separetely from people and their social functions.The more the people that cohabit a place, the more the noise that is being produced, the higher the volume of the sounds, the volume of this manifestation (and also statement) of existing and coexisting. A situation like this is apt to foster all sorts of balances and imbalances: some people search for the utopia of quietness but often become passive receivers and are indifferent to the sonic quality of the urban environment in which they live, some people cannot move around in the streets by themselves without listening to music using headphones or have the habit to play music too loud in their car with the windows open while driving, some people feel alive only when they ‘re at entertainment areas of great noisiness and finally some people cease to listen and end up ignoring a great part of the sonic Athens.
Sometimes we feel that we are participating in our city by participating in the communal silence and some other times we feel the exactly same thing by participating in the communal noise.
It’s clear that all this has not only got to do with individual idiosyncrasies but also reflects social and cultural structures. For example, one can see the link between the meaning of “good-living” and the absence of sound (but also of movement), if one considers that the suburbs of the financially vigorous classes have been turned into “cities of sleep”, where quietness reigns. On the other hand, consumption mania (shopping therapy, massive consumption areas, etc.) is defined by places of loud noise.
Experimental model of sonically visible city
Considering all of the above, Reconstruction Community will proceed in the research of soundscapes of several Athenian areas and also in a series of actions (visit www.reconstruction.gr for a more detailed description of the actions) aiming to the mapping of sonic structures and of course their more or less explicit connection to the public functions and social relations that they reflect.
This exploration aims to the involvement of the habitants through awareness and the participating planning of interventions to the social and personal handling of communal sound. The recording of sonic environments will be combined with certain public space actions during the period from April to August 2008.
All these sonic significations and signalizing will be included in a digital interactive map of the city of Athens followed by all the visual and sonic material that will be gathered throughout the recordings and actions. This map will be presented in a special workshop entitled “T- ihopoiia” that will take place at 9.9.2008 at the Byzantine and Christian museum as part of the “Un-built” project that is being organized by the museum in cooperation with SARCHA/ architectural conductor.
You can see the proposition for participation to the Un-built project by the Reconstruction Community at http://www.reconstruction.gr/en/actions_dtls.php/53
Reconstruction Community