Artworks

Ressonância 7,84 [Ressonance 7.84]

installation
Ressonância 7.84
Ressonância 7.84
© MACAM/Vasco Stocker Vilhena
Date

2009

Technique

Polyester resin ball (diameter 80 cm), audio monitor, C946 Club Of Knobs (electronic sub audio oscillator developed by Kazike), amplifier, nylon net, aluminium case, latex, stethoscope

Dimensions

Dimensões variáveis

This translucent sphere vibrates at one of the frequencies in the electromagnetic belt of planet Earth caused by permanent electrical activity between the Earth's surface and the ionosphere. Part of this excitement are almost stationary waves known as Schumann resonances. Winfried Otto Schumann (1888-1974) predicted the existence of these inaudible resonances in 1952. They pulse with a frequency of around 7.83 Hz. Later, Herbert Konig demonstrated the existence of an unambiguous relationship between the Schumann resonance and the electrical activity of the human brain by comparing electroencephalogram (EEG) recordings with the natural electromagnetic fields of the environment (1979). He then discovered that the main frequency produced by Schumann oscillations is extremely close to the frequency of alpha rhythms in the human brain. What the generator C946 Club Of Knobs, embedded in the sculpture by Carlos Heinrich, obtains is exactly one of the frequencies of the electrical storm which occurs in the cavity between the Earth's surface and the lower layers of the ionosphere: 7.84 Hz. We cannot hear this vibration of matter, even using the stethoscope that is part of the work, given its extreme low frequency (ELF), but we can see, by approaching the pregnant sphere, what this inaudible 'sound' does to the membrane of a subwoofer inside this kind of Gaia's womb. This heuristic exercise, in its mysterious frustration, however, opens our inner vision to the powerful metaphor of this work, not only about the 'critical zone' (Latour B., 2014) of the planet, where everything is gained, lost, and gained again, as long as there is life, but also about the core of the Earth where, in its heart, burn the iron and nickel that generate the magnetism and volcanism needed for the very existence of life.