Light installation “Vocal Tract”, 2018

The project explores a vocal tract as a musical instrument. It is a versatile instrument that has the ability to convey different pitches of sound. To visualize the sound, the artist translates it into the spectrum of light. She adjusts the light using the parameters of light devices so there is a feeling of a sounding light.

The lungs serve as the parameter of the brightness on the diagram, the resonators – as expansion of the beam, the tongue – as stroboscope, etc. The vocal tract illuminates the space. A special alphabet, based on a combination of light and sound parameters, has been created.

Specific Russian phonemes are taken into consideration, and a certain light picture corresponds to each letter of the alphabet. You can set the control knobs to the position indicated in the diagram for a specific letter and see how it sounds.