Specialising in ‘art that explores our relationships with nature and technology’, Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg’s latest installation – Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg - Machine Auguries: Toledo – explores this relationship by simulating a dawn chorus using generative adversarial networks. Two neural networks are used in a ‘call and response’,and are sometimes used to create lifelike but fake images.
‘The work is really about making a copy of the natural world,’ said Ginsberg in a recent interview. ‘We focus so much on innovation and the things we can do, but there’s intelligent life outside in our natural world that we depend on to exist.’
The installation at the Toledo Museum of Art represents Ginsberg’s first solo presentation in the US and her largest indoor installation to date. Taking place over 12 minutes, the experience features the growing light of an artificial dawn and foregrounds our current environment where habitat destruction, climate change and the effects of noise and light pollution are disrupting the dawn chorus.
The artist partnered with a technical consultants from Europe and the US over the installation, including Great Lakes Sound, Engineers Ltd, LightLab and Aurelia Sound Works.
‘The audio system features 24 Danley Sound Labs Cube loudspeakers individually zoned using DAS Integral-MA1604 amplifiers and networked over Dante,’ says Conner Owen of Great Lakes Sound. ‘The lighting uses 69 Encapsulite 1.5m-long LED tubes hung at a raking angle throughout the room. Their eldoLED 180D drivers and 200W power supplies are hidden in a grid above the ceiling, custom painted to blend in with their surroundings.’
The entire system is then triggered via an iPad using Q-Sys Core Nano and CueCore3.
‘Everything about the products we offer are about experience,’ says Danley Sound Eastern Regional Sales Manager, Jay Andrews. ‘Danley loudspeakers and subwoofers are frequently used in the arts and entertainment industry. Our speakers provide incredibly natural and high quality sound, making them perfect for an installation like Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg - Machine Auguries: Toledo.’
More: www.danleysoundlabs.com
