Synaesthesia

Another important strand of my research grew out of my interest in synaesthesia, a condition in which one sensory modality directly stimulates a perceptual experience in another. For example, a synaesthete might be able to hear a colour, or taste a shape (Dann, 1998). I’ve always been fascinated by the visuality of sound, particularly how visual ideas of texture, gesture and transformation can be translated into a sonic language and vice versa. To me, soundscape composition is an inherently audio-visual medium, as our experience of it unfolds in the mind’s eye as much as the ear.

If you’re interested in synaesthesia, you may wish to read an article I wrote, which was recently published in Grey Matter magazine. It’s entitled “Comparing the relationships between music and image-making in the works of Kandinsky and Klee with that of Electroacoustic composers“.

The essay is preceded by a short introduction, which outlines my previous project Sonorous City and how the research for the essay relates to it. To download the full article click the image below:

References

Dann. T (1998) Bright Colours Falsely Seen: Synaesthesia and the Search for Transcendental Knowledge New
Haven: Yale University Press