Shifting Grounds

in collaboration with Hans Demeulenaere  

Ground floor: a subwoofer, eight bass shakers, wooden panels and construction.

First floor: eight transducers, wooden panels and beams.

Second floor: one tweeter from loudspeaker and wooden beams.

Broeltoren, Kortrijk, Belgium

(May 2010)

On three floors of the building, specific architectural and acoustic elements were reinterpreted, reconstructed and transposed to a spatial audio-visual installation. The wooden construction designed by Demeulenaere was based on the shape of the arched wooden ceiling. The sound of the installation was based on a recording by a gamelan orchestra. A specific sound image was created on each floor, starting from the recording and using the acoustics and shape of the space. For example, on the top floor a tweeter from a loudspeaker was placed in the centre of the space, projecting only the highest frequencies of the recording towards the ceiling. The conical shape of the roof was used to distribute the sound evenly in space.


With the support of the Flemish Community, Festival van Vlaanderen Kortrijk and with the technical support of Johan Vandermaelen.
Thanks to Joost Fonteyne, Valentijn Goethals, Stephen Verstraete, Leendert Van Accoleyn, Remi Verstraete, Sebastien Van der Ginst, Kylian Vanderhave, Louis Vanhaverbeke, Roel Geeraerts, Thanh Dat Vo, Kristof Lemmens, Sven Dehens and archer Wilfried Van Quekelberghe