Astrofengaiá - art installation soundscape by quietearth

Materials - Reclaimed trampoline frames, abandonded TV lenses, polycarbonate, mylar window film, NASA sound archives, sound electronics

Commissioned for the Getty Center's 25th Anniversary celebrations, Astrofengaiá is an art installation and creative meditation on cosmologic circularity. Best experienced under bright daytime sun, the light‐refractive artwork is a home‐spun shrine to light, designed to embellish the beauty of our solar system's resident star. Lovingly made from upcycled and reclaimed materials, glistening surfaces create a semi-enclosed meditative space. Mirrored mylar cladding on a circular frame defines a 12’-diameter circular area.

Cushioned seating invites participants to listen through headphones to custom soundscapes crafted from NASA archives, electronica, binaural beats, and spoken word including Zen koan.

The artwork interacts spectacularly with people and with sunlight. Geometric shadows grow and contract with our sun’s daily trek across the sky. Reflective walls act as a giant lens, creating undulating light patterns that move and morph across the ground. Breeze and wind ignite a dance of shapes and color as reflective cladding comes alive with motion. People see their reflections glide across semi-transparent, mirror-like surfaces that merge faces with foreground and background, like a hall of mirrors. Deeply engaging for all adults and children alike, Astrofengaiá merges museum-like beauty with child-like wonder.

The artwork’s name, Astrofengaiá, is a play on words, conjoining the Greek words for starlight (astrofengiá) and mother of all life(Gaia). Thematically, the artwork focuses on interconnectedness, contemplatively reaching back to ancient meditations while fostering modern recognition of our star’s communal membership in an ever-expanding stellar cosmos. Like our star, though each of us is one among billions, human actions reverberate. The artwork’s transmutation of refuse into a glistening meditative space subtly seeds linkages between social responsibility and personal mental well being.

Soundscape arranged by Dina Fisher.

Sounds sources include: NASA, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, voice recordings by Dina Fisher, copyright-free sample packs