Sonic Environments for Inverted Observation



Location:
Bidston Observatory
53° 24′ 02″ N, 3° 04′ 23″ W


Bidston Observatory has amassed various sensing techniques over the last 160 years. Preceding that, Bidston Hill was already an interesting site of environmental sensing and communications for the city of Liverpool. This research encourages us to listen to the logistical media in order to reorientate a counter-technique towards asynchronous alternatives.

The Project
This project excavates a media archaeology of technical devices that have emerged from Bidston Observatory - a site of oceanography and environmental science on the Wirral in north-west England.

Functioning as an almanac of sorts, it serves as both calendar and climate - hearing and feeling an expansive understanding of weather within a building that measured the weather itself.

It consists of a looping and entangled sonic envioronment, incorporating site recordings, conversations and audio synthesis made in the building. 
Methodology
Employing a media archaeological approach to the accumulation of technical objects, this research project allows us to listen to and through various oceanic techniques from the contemporary. Rather than seeking out a chronological media history, the active archive explores present functions and cultural behaviour derived from our relations with logisitical media. 


Semaphore station flag information for Bidston Hill (1826)
Triassic Kemper Sandstone
The One O’Clock Gun at Morpeth Dock
Explosives Act Registry for Time Gun, 1929
Anemometer Dial in the Weather Station
Dome Stairs Over-Construction
Bidston Observatory Postcard
Regulation Testing of Marine Chronometers, 1906
Valerie Gane operating Doodson-Lège Tidal Prediction Machine
Wet Studio Shelving (previously housed the Doodson-Lège Tidal Prediction Machine)
Desert Blown Triassic Sandstone, Bidston Hill
Tidal Prediction during World War II
Storage Room
Inner Dome (East)
Window to Dry Moat

Audio Sources:


1- Hydra Recording, One O’Clock Gun
2- Open-Wave Receiver Radio, Western Dome
3- Dialogue with Tal, Kitchen
4- Ether Recording , Weather Station
5- Vocals  (Re-pitch and Delay), Sub-Basement
6- Textures and Field Recording,  Sub-Basement
7-  Vocals + contact mic, Eastern Dome
8- Hydra Recording, Weather Station
9-  In Your Coded Signal Dance recital    
10- Open-Wave Receiver Radio, Weather Station
11- Walk, Bidston Hill
12- Repitched  Photon Smasher Recording, Radio Studio 13 June 2025                                     05 July 2025                                   06 July 2025                                  
29 August 2025                          
12  June  2025                                   17 April 2025
05 July 2025
30 August 2025
03 September 2025
30 August 2025
31 August 2025
30 August 2025                      

00:00-06:34
04:14-06:12  
03:12-04:25    
04:30-07:30
07:25-10:16
10:01-11:20
11:06-14:20  
14:04- 17:34
15:07-17:18
18:30-21:10
17:52-20:01
18:27-22:27