2019, rainy days, Philharmonie, (LU)

kinetic installation, glass, wood, aluminium,300cm x 300cm

That small incidents influence or even control the bigger event is a central idea in the concept of the sound installation Echotrope, which creates a sensory relationship between two buildings on the Kirchberg(LU) : the Philharmonie, designed by the French star architect Christian de Portzamparc, opened in 2005, and the European Pentagone Safe & Sorry Pavilion, created by the Luxembourg artist Bert Theis. Through these two rooms and spaces, the sound installation thematises the experience of inside and outside, literally juxtaposes auditory and visual experiences. While the movement sequence can be observed visually outside at the pavilion, the effect can be hear ”live” in the foyer of the Philharmonie - through speakers on the ramp. Spaces are translated into each other.

Narrow glass tubes are attached to a rotating platform and recreate the pattern of the philharmonic columns. From the outside, the viewer can watch how the platform in the closed glass house rotates slowly - the duration of the rotation corresponds approximately to the time it takes to walk around the Philharmonie on the ramp of the foyer - at twelve points hammers beat transparent glass columns; the beat is transmitted in real time to twelve speakers, which project their sound onto the columns at the appropriate points on the ramp in the foyer. Whatever happens to the model in the pavilion can be heard in the Philharmonie. The listener in the Philharmonie is invited to reproduce the process of the model in change; hence the creation of the word "echotrope" - from the well-known "echo" and trope, tropus or tropo, which can be understood in terms of change, alternation, but also as the figurative and metaphorical use of the expression “trope”.