La Symphonie des Vagabonds

Hybrid installation

CHRONIQUES Production 2018

This multimedia installation ‘La Symphonie des Vagabonds’ allows us to discover visually and musically the sounds produced by the planets of the solar system.

Combining experimental sciences and dreamlike universes, the artist drew inspiration from Hans Cousto’s mathematical-sonic research and Plato’s theory of ‘The Harmony of the Spheres’ to transpose the movement of the planets in to something audible. These sounds are bewitching and graceful, and seem to be inhabited by different personalities. Here, sound is the triggering element, it precedes form.The visual representation of recorded sound uses cymatics: sonic vibration is made visible on the water and then each vibration-planet is colored according to its colorimetric value.

Eight light projectors then project the resulting represen- tation onto the walls to the rhythm of the symphony. Each planet, in turn, begins to move around the sun in a dance of elusive waves.
Because if ‘symphony’ refers to music, ‘vagabond’ refers to the planets. The etymology of the planet comes from what the Greeks called ‘Planetês’, which means ‘wande- ring’, ‘vagabond’. In Greek astronomy, these planets were defined in opposition to fixed stars.