innerEars: Cut Throat | Cyclofoozelphone | Sparks on Paper | Creak Speak
The Giver of Names | soundmap | Response Time

Ron Kuivila

Sparks on Paper

Above Inspirations Dancewear | 44 Queen Street South in Kitchener

In Sparks on Paper, pairs of wires are used to distribute sparks throughout a space a foot or two above the heads of visitors. The power of these sparks is carefully limited to the level of carpet shock, so they are safe to touch and generate a minimal amount of ozone. Simple resonators made of paper are attached to the wires to create a sound field of subtly shifting timbres and overtone.

A spark is a piece of electrical multimedia in its rawest form - a single impulse of light and sound. But the small sparks I work with are oddly allergic to representation in electronic media. Audio recordings do not capture the omindirectional diffusion of their sound,on video recordings the sparks look like drop out. I am particularly fond of this aspect of the project, it makes it a little oasis outside of the range of the mediascape but built out of its most basic parts.

Sparks on Paper was commissioned by the Donaueschinger Musiktage in
2000.