Evolution is an audio-visual performance and installation celebrating the vitality of inorganic materials, inspired by the material’s self-organising behaviours in Cymatics. Featuring a live moving image and a quadraphonic system, it provides a digital-analog self-organising system that allows the provided luminous powder and the sonic landscape to evolve together. The audience will be taken on a journey where they are scaled down, and they will experience the vibrational environment as the powders do.

This piece aims to present the emergence of “lifeform” in the material, and the complex interrelationship and entanglement with the sonic environment. We thus hope to provoke a new perception of non-living substances and a reconsideration of our relationship with them.

“Evolution” is an immersive audio-visual installation and performance that celebrates the vitality of inorganic materials. The project takes its inspiration from the physics phenomenon of Cymatics, which has demonstrated that certain substances can autonomously form complex patterns in response to vibrations. This phenomenon challenges the traditional understanding of life and poses the question: can inorganic materials be considered as life forms if they can respond to external stimuli? This project aims to inspire a new perception of non-living substances, and contribute to an ongoing philosophical debate on the nature of life and the relationship between the animate and the inanimate.

“Evolution” employs a digital-analog generative system that allows luminous powders and the sonic landscape to evolve together, freeing matter from its passive role. The sound is composed around the sonic textures collected from the material utilising a granulator and generative algorithm, directing the powders to move. Meanwhile, a live image recognition program employs particle behaviours to modulate the sound. Each element performs in response to the changes of the other, giving rise to a complex and dynamic system that challenges conventional notions of causality and interactivity.

This piece features a live moving image and a unique quadraphonic system where the four sound channels are splitted into a quad of transducers and monitor speakers. Through the immersive audiovisual experience, viewers are enveloped in a sonic haze that blurs the boundary between their individuality and the surrounding spatio-temporal structure. As the sound energy from the installation permeates their bodies, viewers are able to experience the vibrational environment in a manner akin to the non-living powders. This experience challenges traditional hierarchical perspectives and allows viewers to appreciate the power and agency of the non-human material world.