Overview: video documentation 2.8 MB
Occidio reinterpreted NASA scientific visualizations documenting global warming through the interplay of video, sound and drawing. The work was first installed at School 33 Art Center in Baltimore, MD from December 14, 2002 through March 7, 2003. In this work of environmental art visitors saw and heard the sound of global warming.

Form and Installation:
The installation employed a video projector; a DVD player; 2 optical theremin sound synthesizers; a computer; and 4 large drawing panels that also acted as speakers. The entire drawing panel was activated as a speaker by a transducer, which transmitted the sound to the shell of the wood drawing panels. The panels depicted creatures and plants affected by climate change in Baltimore and the Chesapeake Bay.

The sound created in Occidio was directly generated by events projected in climate change simulations provided by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. Global warming data ranged from the local, such as the distribution of paved and impervious surfaces in Baltimore, to the global, such as the Antarctic Ozone Hole. The theremins used in Occidio modulated sound when light played over a photosensitive receptor. Hue and value changes in the video raised or lowered oscillator pitches to perform different reactive tones; a computer further processed the audio signal with granular synthesis software. The abstract yet elegiac sound generated by Occidio was musical, but also presented an alternative means of interpreting complex scientific data. The work was well received upon its installation in Baltimore, and was featured in a report by Anna Solomon-Greenbaum on a broadcast of National Public Radio's " Living on Earth."

Earth Observatory at GSFC
Global Change Master Directory at GSFC
Earth Sciences Directorate at GSFC

Occidio was supported by an Individual Artists Grant from the Maryland State Arts Council.

For more information please contact:

Timothy Nohe
Associate Professor
Department of Visual Arts
University of Maryland Baltimore County
FA 111, 1000 Hilltop Circle, Baltimore, MD 21250 USA
nohe@umbc.edu

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