Lynchpin Patron:
Nigel Helyer aka Dr Sonique
Artist – Sculptor and New Media Artist
Lynchpin is thrilled to have Nigel Helyer as Patron.
Nigel is an independent sculptor and sound-artist. He is the director of a small multi-disciplinary team “Sonic Objects; Sonic Architecture” with an international reputation for large scale sound-sculpture installations, museum interactives and new media projects.
Nigel’s practice is actively inter-disciplinary linking creative practice with scientific research and development all of which sit well with Lynchpin’s aim to encourage the arts/science dialogue.
Nigel’s activities include; the development of a ‘Virtual Audio Reality’ system in collaboration with Lake Technology (Sydney) and the ongoing ‘AudioNomad’ research project in location sensitive Environmental Audio at the School of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of New South Wales.
IMAS Artist-in-Resdience and Collaborative Project, 2012
Nigel was Artist-in-Residence at the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies (IMAS), Hobart on four occasions in 2012, collaborating with scientist Dr Mary-Anne Lea on a new series of work: Vox on the Rox.
Vox on the Rox makes its debut!
The Conservatorium of Music Recital Hall, Hobart, 27th April 2012 – saw a concert which explored the marine environments and creatures of the Southern Ocean. Extensive and extremely complex datasets collected by southern elephant seals diving under Antarctic Ice, or transiting across the Southern Ocean, represent a considerable interpretive challenge and provided the potential for a hybrid art and science collaboration between Dr Mary Anne Lea and Dr Nigel Helyer to explore new methods of and forms for manifesting the data.
Three short movements, accompanied by data projections of the graphical score and environmental imagery, were realised through improvised sound created by the Conservatorium Improvisation Collective iCon ~ translating digital information via visualisations into sonifications.
Vox on the Rox was supported by the Australian Network for Art and Technology in association with the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body. The project has been developed with the support and generosity of the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies, University of Tasmania, the Conservatorium of Music, University of Tasmania and the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystem Cooperative Research Centre, University of Tasmania.
VoxAura; the River Sings, 2011
Last year’s VoxAura – The River Sings project was part of the Turku is Listening program, Tuku, Finland, and clearly demonstrates the understanding and particular link that makes Nigel the perfect Patron for Lynchpin.
Of VoxAura Nigel writes:
As terrestrial dwellers it is easy to overlook the fact that we inhabit an essentially two-dimensional space that has surface area but scant depth.
By contrast the marine world is three-dimensional, it’s depths accounting for 99% of the Biosphere and it’s surface accounting for 70% of the planets area. The ocean forms the principal inter-face for chemical exchange with the atmosphere, absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen – it is the pump that drives climate and regulates the air we breath.
VoxAura; the River Sings project as part of the Turku 2011, European Capital of Culture. Finland, suggests that we pay attention to these complex issues that ultimatly control our destiny by listening to the chemical composition of the Baltic.
Learn more about the prolific range of Nigel’s work at Sonicobjects
In particular see his Radiolarians
and BioSonics works
through which he explores the morphology of microscopic marine organisms.
Watch Nigel talk about his work: