1987
First published [Dutch, English], in Kunst and Museum Journaal, Volume 4 Number 6, 1993, Amsterdam
Siren - Aural Design
Current thinking in the fields of architecture and urban planning is beginning to scratch the surface of the possibilities for design with sound. Sound level has become a criterion in the design of some of the machines we live with. Old ideas about using the sound of public fountains to cover up the sounds of traffic have come back into vogue. The idea of a need for acoustic isolation in housing-- acoustic privacy - is also beginning to surface as an issue.
Yet, many of our ideas about the ideal sound environment are still both naive and misguided. Decorating public spaces with music doesn't work. Taste in music is highly personal - one person's music will always be someone else's MUZAK*. Silence is not only impractical, but it also is not the answer. The total deprivation of sound is no less traumatic than the total deprivation of light - what we hear is as much sensory food as what we see.
Sound is as important an aspect of how we orient ourselves as vision. We sense the size and nature of a space with our ears as well as with our eyes. Our sense of position and motion come from a combination of both aural and visual cues. Hearing and vision are two different perceptual universes with different dimensions - they are opposite perceptual systems, which complement each other.
We can of course use the attributes of sound as materials to shape our environment in the same way we now use light, color and form. The reason this has not been done before is probably because we have not had the means - although man has had the ability to create visual images for thousands of years, it is only in this century that he has gained the ability to manipulate sound. We have only had the capability to form a sound image - a recording - for the past forty years.
Now, though, we may be entering what we could call a sound Renaissance. In the past decade techniques for making and shaping sound have taken quantum steps. For the first time in history, one can say that a real palette for sound exists.
These new means make it possible for us to imagine making a world where sound is not just a byproduct of what we build, but one where we are able to consider aural and visual components equally in the design of our environment.
Max Neuhaus, 1987
*MUZAK The generic term for the background music in elevators, office lobbies and airports in the United States.