Running up Parliament Hill early this morning when a pack of runners doing a 10k ran the other way on the turf in “silence”. I say silence – their sound was actually incredible. About a hundred people not saying anything, feet hitting mud and grass, breathing in a sort of unison. It was only silence in a social sense. The actual experience of it was a sort of soft rythmic murmur.
I have been working with some partners on a treatment for a short film about running and had been wondering how it might sound. I wondered how you might capture that collection of sounds you make yourself and separate it from hearing in close proximity. Now I am not sure you can.
The ambient noise of the environment we pass though daily are incredibly subtle and we are programmed to treat a lot of it as if it is actually silence – when its clearly rich and complex. A lot of new household products are full of unsubtle, and I would say, undesigned blips and beeps. They haven’t taken the lesson of our smart devices and allowed them to be malleable to allow help them suit the needs of the people or the environment they are performing in. I want a kettle with a beep designed Brian Eno.
ideas/forms/functions 