Dominique Koch (CH, 1983) & Tobias Koch (CH, 1986)
Residency period: May – July 2022
During our residency we started a research project titled terratones.fm, which resulted in a 30 day live radio broadcast and a series of glass sculptures.
We were exploring the acoustic ecologies of the area by collecting sounds from a series of microphones, including hydrophones, soil microphones, geophones, infra- and ultrasound microphones. This bioacoustic material was fed into a sound software, where it was combined with musical arrangements and then live broadcasted for 30 days nonstop. A series of sensors were installed on-site to capture plant, tree, and climate fluctuations. This data was influencing the live broadcast in real-time, affecting musical aspects and manipulations of the sounds heard. To expand our research, we spoke to Eduardo Kohn, Jeremy Narby and Salomé Voegelin on ideas around sound, vibration and listening. Extracts of these recorded conversations fed into the live broadcast as well. Inspired by the idea of a weather station, terratones.fm allowed the audience to listen in on the site and its changing environment.
As a second part of our project we made a series of glass objects titled Sound Fossils. Using the vibration and air pressure of sound, an experimental glass blowing technique was employed to determine the shape and form of the sculptural objects. A process that is a mutation of the sonic, creating physical remnants of the sonic environment, fossilized vestiges.
terratones.fm as a work-in-progress will continue to unfold. — Dominique Koch & Tobias Koch
Dominique Koch and Tobias Koch are fascinated by the rich orchestra of nature’s hidden sounds, the vast sonic information that is constantly present yet inaudible to human ears. During their residency at La Becque, Dominique and Tobias proposed ways of uncovering them, making them physically tangible, audible, and visible.
Dominique Koch lives and works in Basel and Paris. From 2004 until 2011 she studied photography at the Academy of Visual Arts in Leipzig. She understands her installations as “thinking laboratories” that merge different fields of research resulting in hybrid entanglements and unlikely intellectual encounters.
Recent solo exhibitions include Holobiont Society at CAN—Centre d’art Neuchâtel, Maybe We Should Rejuvenate the Words Rather Than the Bodies at Rinomina in Paris and Beyond Chattering and Noise at Centre Culturel Suisse Paris.
Tobias Koch is a Basel and Berlin-based composer and sound designer working across performance, visual arts, film, and music. He studied at the Hochschule für Musik in Basel and has since exhibited and performed his own work at the Leopold Museum Vienna, Lateral Roma, CND Paris, and various theaters throughout Europe.
His work Such Sweet Thunder, with Thibault Lac and Tore Wallert, won the Young Choreographers Award at ImPulsTanz Festival in 2019. His sound design and music compositions were featured in several award-winning films presented at Film Festival Cannes, Locarno Film Festival, IFFR Rotterdam, Berlinale and Toronto International Film Festival, and others.
Dominique Koch & Tobias Koch, La Becque Open Studios Summer 2022