BLACK ROCK CITY, USA City of Sound: City of Dust

Black Rock City is constructed and deconstructed every year in the desert of Nevada. The city is laid out in a radial grid which is then filled in by organized camps and tens of thousands of individuals who purchase a ticket for the week-long Burning Man festival. The satellite-view order of the grid, however, is countered at the ground level by the visual chaos of ad hoc camps and structures built without zoning or building codes. Navigation becomes a delicate, curious, and at times anxious act of filtering the background noise, following the pulsating beats, and leading with one’s ears to find new art destinations and experiences. Getting lost may very well be the objective of one’s experience at Burning Man.
This installation investigates the basic problem of way-finding within an unfamiliar urban milieu. Five acrylic sound panels play a soundscape which embodies a core component of sound mediating our experience of the city. Those five core components are as follows:
1. Sound orients people within a place.
2. Sound marks and measures time.
3. Sound produces touch at a distance
4. Sound provides isolation for the self.
5. Sound encourages exploration between events.