Make Waves: A Sonic Playscape

Abstract of ThesisMake WavesA Sonic Playscape Our senses shape our reality through which we understand the world around us. Each sense has a unique ability to activate different regions within our brains; forming complex memories that we use to recall our past. We are dependent upon these senses at all times, which means we are experiencing ever-changing sensory information at all times. “Our five senses–sight, hearing, touch, taste and smell–seem to operate independently, as five distinct modes of perceiving the world. In reality, however, they collaborate closely to enable the mind to better understand its surroundings. We can become aware of this collaboration under special circumstances.” It is through multi-sensory information that our perception of the world begins to take shape into transcendent experiences. The goal of Make Waves: A Sonic Playscape is to explore how the mind perceives its environment using the sense of hearing as the primary source of sensory stimuli. This thesis will examine sound as an ever-present phenomenon that occurs in our world, how the brain experiences sound and our other senses on psychological and neurological levels, and how the use of play creates a more intimate connection to the subject being presented. To make these correlate, visitors will engage with five sections: “Silence”, “Sight and Sound”, “Touch and Sound”, “Sight, Touch and Sound”, and “Cymatics” (visualization of sound wave vibrations as they interact with materials). Each section provides the visitor with unique interactive elements demonstrating how sound can be affected using play as the method for this understanding. In addition, each section utilizes a different combination of sensory information to stimulate the brain. From this process, the exhibition proposes to create a different approach for multi-sensory experiences in museums and galleries. Utilizing the effects of the brain as it is stimulated through sound will attempt to provide a method where there can be a better balance of the senses in an exhibition. The visitor will have a similar understanding of the power that sound, and music possesses over their own personality and perception of the world. When they leave, they will be more aware of how sound is constant in the world.

Author

• Andreas, Kyle

Language

• en

Date created

• 2018

Type of Work

• Master's Thesis

License

• All rights reserved

Rights statement

• In Copyright

GW Unit

• Exhibition Design

Degree

• M.A.

Advisor

• Brennan, Barbara

Committee Member(s)

• Crellin, Naomi
• Briggs, Nigel

Persistent URL

•  https://scholarspace.library.gwu.edu/etd/5t34sj95h