Recent travels have brought me into contact with some difficult and potentially dangerous places. Most are sites of major environmental/ecological damage, but others include nuclear sites or the edges of military zones. The danger is not necessarily to a short-term visitor, but to the people who live there or through the location's role in geopolitical power structures. Some are areas where extreme and hostile conditions have been created, in others the danger has been hidden or absorbed into the local economy. In yet others regeneration is underway.
Such places include the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, Ukraine; the Caspian Oil Fields near Baku, Azerbaijan; the Munzur River (a Euphrates tributary) valley in Kurdish Turkey where 19 very controversial dams are planned; Thetford Forest beside USAF air bases in the UK; North Wales in the areas where Chernobyl fallout will effect farming practice for years to come.
Many sound recordings were made at these sites. Photographic and other visual images were taken. Interviews and background research provide textual documents. It is noticeable that dangerous places can be both sonically and visually compelling, even beautiful and atmospheric. There is, often, an extreme dichotomy between an aesthetic response and knowledge of the 'danger', whether it is pollution, social injustice, military or geopolitical. The project asks, "What can we learn by listening to the sounds of dangerous places?
This talk will concentrate on recordings made at sites in the UK
Peter Cusack, based in London, works as a sound artist, musician and environmental recordist with a special interest in acoustic ecology. Projects range from community arts to research into the role that sound plays in our sense of place. His project 'Sounds From Dangerous Places' examines the soundscapes of sites of major environmental damage.
He produced 'Vermilion Sounds' - the environmental sound program - for ResonanceFM Radio, London, lectures on 'Sound Arts & Design' at the London College of Communication and is a Research Fellow on the multidisciplinary multi-university 'Positive Soundscapes Project'. CDs include 'Your Favourite London Sounds' (Resonance), 'Baikal Ice' (ReR), 'Favourite Sounds of Beijing'
