Voicing the Genius Loci – an ongoing process
A Row of Trees: The Journal of The Sonic Art Research Unit
Volume 1, Issue 2, 2022
Intro
Genius Loci: The genius of the place (Italian ‘genius locii’) can be defined as ‘the spirit of the place’. Contributed to the Romans.
Although I was trained in lens-based media, sound has crept into my art practice more and more. Especially so in the strand of work that I see as an ongoing search for the genius loci of place. Early attempts at discovering/catching/communing (I don’t think my intentions were particularly clear at the time) with such a ’spirit of place’ were through the medium of large format photography. For one project I went in search of ley lines across Britain, photographing burial mounds, road crossings and other topographic markers that supposedly formed straight lines across the landscape. This search through the camera lens often incorporated the added temporal element of a long shutter speed, as if more time spent “soaking up the energies” would yield greater results...
