Peter Cusack :: Sounds from Dangerous Places :: Enter3-3rd International Festival for Arts, Sciences and Technologies :: STONE BELL HOUSE (cellar) :: Staroměstské náměstí 13, Praha 1 :: November 8 - 11, 2007; 10:00 - 21:00.

Sounds from the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone asks the following questions: What elements of the soundscape of a dangerous place are effected, changed, created or destroyed as a result of its ‘dangerousness’? What insights can sound offer into the environmental, social and political contexts of a ‘dangerous place’? The project presents the field recordings as they are, in the belief that such recordings offer insights into the locations and issues that are different from, and complimentary to, those of visual images and texts. Supplementary questions are: What information about place can field recordings give that is special to sound? And, conversely, what information is given by the other media that sound cannot?

Peter Cusack, based in London, works as a sound artist, musician and environmental recordist with a special interest in environmental sound and acoustic ecology. Projects move from community arts to research into the contribution of sound to our senses of place to recordings that document areas of special sonic interest, e.g. Lake Baikal, Siberia, and Xinjang, China’s most western province. He was involved in ‘Sound & the City’ the British Council sound art project in Beijing 2005. His current project ‘Sounds from Dangerous Places’ examines the soundscapes of sites of major environmental damage, e.g. Chernobyl, the Azerbaijan oil fields, controversial dams on the Tigris and Euphratees river systems in south east Turkey. He initiated the ‘Your Favourite London Sound’ project that aims to discover what Londoners find positive in their city’s soundscape, an idea that has been repeated in other world cities including Beijing and Chicago. He produced ‘Vermilion Sounds’ a monthly environmental sound program on ResonanceFM radio, London, and lectures on ‘Sound Arts & Design’ at the London College of Communication. Recently, he was appointed research fellow on the Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council’s multidisciplinary ‘Positive Soundscapes Project’.