Image: Max Neuhaus © The Estate of Max Neuhaus
In 1978 I decided to try to design a better set of sound signals for emergency vehicles. I suppose one of the first questions that comes to mind is why an artist, even one who works with sound, was interested in leaving the comfortable confines of the world of culture to design new sounds for police cars, ambulances and fire trucks. m.n.
In the 1980's Neuhaus took on the problem of redesigning the sounds of emergency-vehicle sirens. The project's focuses were to make sounds that were locatable in an urban environment so people would know what to do when they heard one, to allow drivers of emergency vehicles to hear one another when their sirens were on so they wouldn't run into each other, and to make sounds we could live with – which would have authority without being authoritarian.
siren-aural-design-dutch-english-kunst-museum-journaal-amsterdam-vol-4-no-6-1993