Upper NY Harbor West 2009
video & sound by M Clarke / 5:00
In relative scale and respectively positioned from West to East in the installation, a seismic map of the Upper NY harbor divided into three cross sections of subsurface layers forty-eight meters deep, are sent into shifting motion. The amplitude gray scale of the sub-bottom profile is sent into activated video and sound; the samples of reflected active sonar sound are sent, rise back to the surface, dissolve and rebuild. In shape-shifting states, eluding a long or fixed view, falling, building and shifting, grains like specs of signals move as the Hudson itself, in constant motion and in both directions. As the Alquonquans named the Hudson River, Muhheakantuck, meaning "great waters in constant motion" or "river that runs both ways."
With Acoustic Imaging we realize a subsurface and topography beneath a more lucid body of water that is shaping it; a
particular view of this space and matter, as well as a view of deep time in history comes to the surface via sent sound signals.
This work is the first in an ongoing series that uses the process of underwater profiling otherwise called Acoustic Imaging.
The map and data used for this piece collected as part of the Hudson River Benthic Mapping Project, kindly provided by
Dr. Frank O. Nitsche, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University.
Special sound application translating data into audible sound waves created by Peter Holler.
More Technical Information and Location of Profile