Deep Listening

Extreme Slow Walk (pp. 29)
This exercise requires the user to walk at their slowest pace possible while maintaining posture. Oliveros writes that “The challenge for this exercise is that no matter how slow you are walking, you can always go much slower” (29). My first reaction to this exercise was surprise at my poor balance, but as I continued, I righted myself and maintained my slow walk. Eventually, it felt like a meditative practice as I started focusing on my breathing along with the walk.
Palms of Hands (pp. 25-26)
This exercise instructs the listener to imagine a “ball of energy” in their hands, and then move the ball of energy near their body where they can feel it as a tingling sensation. I did feel a sort of tingling energy in my hands after vigorously rubbing them together, but I’m not sure if that was due mostly to the friction and fatigue from rubbing them so hard.
I feel like this exercise ties in to my response to Hannah’s gift. I created a piece of interactive media that turns the user’s hands into a sort of virtual energy capable of producing sound and changing an environment. Perhaps by pairing the exercise with my project, one could enhance their experience and feel a sort of energy within themselves.
Listening (pp. 24)
Oliveros instructs the reader to listen to environmental sounds and the sounds of their “own thoughts” for a period of time. She offers a mantra that the participant can use to stay grounded in the exercise. I conducted this exercise in my apartment, where I heard the sounds of my refrigerator, A/C unit, and plumbing. I also heard faint street sounds. The exercise was extremely meditative, and was my favorite of the three.

Hannah’s Gift

The gift that I received from Hannah is a necklace that she made. She crocheted the necklace out of yarn. The necklace looks like a bunch of flowers in a sort of random arrangement that goes around the entire neck.

While Hannah didn’t have the physical necklace, she showed me a photo she had taken after completing it. Looking closely at it, you can see how much effort Hannah took to crochet the jewelry, with all of the flowers being different sizes and colors. I have massive respect for people who are good at knitting and crocheting; it’s a form of art that takes a lot of patience.

My Response

To respond to Hannah’s gift, I used TouchDesigner (TD) and Ableton to create an interactive arrangement of flowers that responds to the movement of a user’s index finger. To detect fingers, I used MediaPipe, a plugin for TD. When the user moves their finger in front of their webcam, the flowers move depending on where their hand is, giving the effect of “moving” the flowers. Additionally, moving flowers trigger a sample to play in Ableton, inviting the user to explore sound in the interactive environment; some may choose to chaotically swipe through many notes, while others may gently pick and choose certain flowers to play one at a time.

I chose to create something in TD mainly because it is very familiar to me; I also find creating interactive art in TD to be very satisfying. The sounds that occur when the user interacts with the flowers are also inspired by the chaotic yet pleasing arrangement of flowers in her design.

Given more time, I would choose to create more unique sounds for the flower interactions. I would also create visual effects to accompany each flower.

You can view photos of my process and a demo video below.