Industrial past colliding with artistic futures

Where the river Rhein and Ruhr intersect in Germany, you will find Duisburg. This former industrial city is known for bad football, mafia shootings and the Love Parade disaster. While the heavy industry, which brought prosperity to the port town in the 50s and 60s, has demised with the Strukturwandel in the 1980s, steel is still shaping its landscape.

This Cinematic VR experience portrays the city’s public art, the Rhine Orange, Landschaftspark, Love Parade memorial and Tiger Turtle – Magic Mountain through audio-visual abstraction. As a kaleidoscope brings new perspectives into interaction through reflection, Steel City aims to change the stereotypical representation of this post-industrial region. By means of using an accelerometer microphone, the sound of these steel sculptures was recorded and provided inspiration for the visual treatment of the video artwork.

Kaleidoscope translates from ancient Greek for observation in beautiful form. Max Schleser captured these public artworks with an omnidirectional video camera and Simon Longo/Dithernoise’s original soundscape for this audio-visual experience is based on the field recordings. The Cinematic VR experience as much as the public artworks, display the dialectic of change and stagnation.

Spatial audio encoding by Darius Kedros at Sonic State Design in the Garden Studio Melbourne. Please enjoy with headphones. Available as Third Order Ambisonics on request.