Hearing Trouble: Sound Art in Post-Conflict Cities

听力障碍是一个跨学科的研究项目，旨在通过对声音和声音艺术的研究来更好地理解城市环境，重点关注冲突后城市经历快速和彻底变化的特殊情况。我们的研究将集中在柏林和贝尔法斯特，这两个城市支持充满活力的声音艺术家社区，并拥有类似的建筑和规划文化。与绝大多数通过视觉焦点研究建筑环境的研究项目不同，我们的研究将通过多种听觉视角分析和响应快速变化的城市景观。该项目将由一位声音艺术历史学家/实践者（PI）和一位建筑师/建筑历史学家（Co-I）领导，他们通过他们的研究小组重组城市：声音艺术和城市建筑（www.recomposingthecity.org）建立了坚实的合作研究基础。“听力障碍”将是这个小组的第一个重要的国际研究项目，展示了声音艺术和建筑之间合作研究的巨大潜力。首先，我们将批判性地分析1989年以来柏林的声音艺术项目和倡议，这些项目和倡议回应了这座城市冲突后的状况。柏林是国际公认的声音艺术研究和创作的领导者，拥有丰富的声音艺术展览，教育计划和参与建筑环境问题的倡议。我们将分析的项目范围从城市范围的声音艺术节到城市和公共空间的特定场地的声音装置。主要项目包括柏林的“调谐城市”音乐节，以及彼得·库萨克（Peter Cusack）的“柏林声音场所”（2012），该项目汇集了声音艺术家、规划师、建筑师和社区，共同考虑柏林的三个主要重建地点。我们将进一步研究波恩之声（Bonn Hoeren），这是一个正在进行的项目，由柏林策展人Carsten Seiffarth构思和指导，波恩市每年（2010-2020）任命一位城市之声艺术家。通过检查档案材料（即项目文件和评论），并通过采访艺术家，策展人，艺术管理人员，社区团体，建筑师/规划师和观众，我们将展示声音艺术倡议如何影响人们理解柏林和波恩的方式。我们对不同项目的批判性分析将从声音艺术和建筑的角度结合起来，呈现出声音研究和建筑研究的独特融合。以柏林和波恩作为范例项目的来源，然后我们将研究自1998年以来在贝尔法斯特的声音艺术，贝尔法斯特是一个冲突后的城市，拥有新兴的声音艺术从业者社区和关于建筑环境的日益增长的话语。在贝尔法斯特，我们同样会采访广泛的从业者和其他利益相关者，包括建筑师和城市规划师。我们的最终目标是为贝尔法斯特的未来发展提供信息，作为其他欧盟城市的潜在典范。通过与贝尔法斯特的建筑师、规划师和声音艺术家的合作研讨会，我们将开发并提出新的设计策略，将声音与城市环境联系起来。此外，通过与艺术和建筑社区以及城市规划官员的信息会议，我们将展示如何更细致地了解声音环境可以帮助建立更好的社区。这些讨论和较早的研究将构成一份咨询说明的基础，该说明将提出关于规划和健全方面的良好做法的建议，并将共同撰写一本书、会议论文和一个网站。2015年，北爱尔兰的计划权力将从中央控制下放到地方当局。因此，这项研究有可能对政策及其最终对建筑环境的影响产生重大而直接的影响。

Hearing Trouble is a cross-disciplinary research project that seeks to better understand the urban environment through an examination of sound and sonic art, focusing on the particular conditions of post-conflict cities undergoing rapid and radical change. Our research will focus on Berlin and Belfast, cities that support vibrant communities of sound artists and that have similar architecture and planning cultures. In contrast to the vast majority of research projects that examine the built environment through a visual focus, our research will analyse and respond to rapidly changing cityscapes via multiple aural perspectives. The project will be lead by a sonic arts historian/practitioner (PI), and an architect/architectural historian (Co-I), who have established a strong foundation of collaborative research through their research group Recomposing the City: Sonic Art and Urban Architectures (www.recomposingthecity.org). Hearing Trouble will be the first major international research project to emerge from this group, demonstrating the significant potential of collaborative research between sonic arts and architecture. In the first instance, we will critically analyse sound art projects and initiatives in Berlin since 1989 that respond to the city's post-conflict conditions. Berlin is internationally recognized as a leader in sonic arts research and creation and has a rich history of sound art exhibition, education programmes, and initiatives that engage issues of the built environment. The projects we will analyse range from city-wide sound art festivals to site-specific sound installations in urban and public space. Key projects include the Tuned City festival in Berlin, and Peter Cusack's Berlin Sonic Places (2012), which brought together sound artists, planners, architects and communities in considering three major redevelopment sites in Berlin. We will further study Bonn Hoeren, an ongoing project conceived and directed by the Berlin-based curator Carsten Seiffarth in which the city of Bonn appoints a City Sound Artist each year (2010-2020). By examining archival material (i.e. project documentation and critique), and by interviewing artists, curators, arts administrators, community groups, architects/planners and audiences, we will show how sound art initiatives have affected the ways in which Berlin and Bonn are understood. Our critical analysis of different projects will emerge from combined sonic arts and architecture perspectives, presenting a unique merging of sound studies and architectural research. Using Berlin and Bonn as sources of exemplar projects, we will then examine sound art since 1998 in Belfast, a post-conflict city with an emerging community of sound art practitioners and a growing discourse about the built environment. In Belfast we will similarly interview a wide range of practitioners and other stakeholders, including architects and city planners. Our ultimate goal is for the research to inform the future development of Belfast, as a potential exemplar for other EU cities. Through Collaborative Workshops with architects, planners, and sound artists in Belfast, we will develop and propose new design strategies that consider sound in relation to the urban environment. Further, through Information Sessions with arts and architecture communities and city planning officials, we will show how a more nuanced understanding of the sound environment can help build better communities. These discussions and the earlier research will form the basis of an Advice Note which will give recommendations on good practice in relation to planning and sound, as well as a co-authored book, conference papers and a Web site. Hearing Trouble is proposed as Northern Ireland's planning powers are being devolved from centralised control to local authorities in 2015. Thus this research has the potential for significant and immediate impact on policy as well as its eventual repercussions in the built environment.