Responding to Sound and Studying the Varying Perceptions of Place.

Beginning my investigation into the perception of natural landscapes, I have been revisiting the sound piece I completed in December, a collection of ambient natural sounds recorded along the walk to Sunny Cove which I had previously recorded through video.

I listened to this sound recording with headphones, whilst simultaneously drawing in response to the audio using pieces of charcoal and rock I had sourced along the walk to Sunny Cove back in December, as a reference to the landscape.

Sound Drawing (recorded sound) #5

Sound Drawing (recorded sound) #4

I then completed a larger drawing in the same way on scrunched brown paper, which worked effectively as a reference to the sound behind the drawing as the paper itself was noticeably audible when moved. This piece felt especially performative because of its larger size enabling me to draw in a more bodily way, spreading my arms out to draw with both hands at the same time, eyes closed, in an almost dance-like manner.

Larger Scale, Brown Paper Sound Drawing (recorded sound)

These drawings initially felt rather uninspiring, the first three done with a piece of rock did not show up on the paper very clearly and I felt that they did not have the natural energy I wanted to capture. However my later attempts with charcoal were much more visceral, whether this was due to the change in medium or that continually doing these drawings increasingly made me able to focus on the sounds and my response to them without giving too much thought to the outcome. To eliminate my visual influence on these drawings I closed my eyes whilst doing them, which worked well to avoid simply drawing a landscape scene.

I found that, while repeatedly doing these drawings, I began to draw to the rhythm of the sounds of the audio piece such as the waves crashing. I personally felt increasingly connected to both the sound and the materials (charcoal/rock and paper) the more drawings I completed, in an almost meditative way.

Some Notes I Made After Completing the Larger Scale Drawing

With the aim of giving my ‘sound drawings’ a more visceral, real, energy, I took the idea of blind drawing whilst listening to ambient natural sounds and did this in the landscape, with the live sound of that landscape influencing my next drawings.

Live Sound Drawing #4

Live Sound Drawing #3

Sitting on the rocks next to the sea, with the waves crashing only about a metre away, I used fragments of rock found loose next to me to draw in response to the sounds of this landscape by Swanpool Beach.

Immediately, these drawings contained more energy. From just looking at the drawings now back in my studio, I can tell that #4 was the drawing for which I moved even closer to the waves, sat on a rock almost getting splashed, due to the greater energy and force present within the drawing. Again with these drawings I felt myself drawing to the rhythm of the waves, and this can even be seen in some of the drawings, especially #2 where many of the lines seem to flow into each other.

A key reason for the more visceral, real, nature of the drawings done to live sound is likely to be that physically being in the landscape myself whilst drawing to the sounds also subjected me to other sensory material. Though I had my eyes closed again, I could still smell the seaweed, sea water and the earth surrounding me and feel the sun on my side, the wind in my hair, the rocks I was sat on. This gave a much more holistic interpretation of the landscape, which in turn produced much more vivid drawings as opposed to the ones done indoors, with purely sound (no other sensory material).

I attended a talk from St Ives artist Sax Impey, some of whose work includes visceral, detailed charcoal drawings of the sea and sea photographs transferred onto nautical charts. Impey takes many sailing trips which massively inform his practice; his first-hand experience of the sea and its conditions, his log books, sketches and photographs all combine as material to create these drawings from.

Sax Impey 'Biscay, Night of the 7th July' Silkscreen on Somerset Soft Velvet 350g paper

A collection of work that particularly interests me was exhibited at the Millennium Gallery (now Anima-Mundi) in St Ives in 2011 and entitled ‘Storm’. This exhibition was a collection of these drawings/paintings made in response to a sailing trip between Ireland and Newlyn during an immense storm. The artist’s perception of the seascape over this 36 hour period was translated into these works, and is what intrigues me most about this series of drawings. His experience of the sea along this journey was controlled by natural phenomena; the weather conditions – the artist’s perception of this seascape, and therefore the resulting drawings, would have been drastically different had the water been completely calm. This is something I am interested to explore further; how natural phenomena such as weather can massively alter how a natural environment is perceived, and I will be able to explore this in my upcoming work through the changing of the seasons from Winter to Spring, and how the landscapes I walk and create work within, and consequentially my perception of these landscapes, changes over time.