I was faculty lead for Theatre of Vibrations, an interdisciplinary course developed and taught at Iowa State University in the College of Design. The class designed and build large-scale interactive musical instruments to activate an un-used or empty space in a town in Iowa. The team explored ways an interactive immersive experience can activate a space, bring new attention to an undersused location, and engage the surrounding community. Faculty leads teamed up with the City of Ottumwa to activate their historic downtown theatre which had been sitting empty for many years.

View the complete project including process, prototypes, and interaction experiments at the project’s website: www.theatreofvibrations.com

The Prompt

Design and build a large-scale, interactive, sound-generating sculpture that users can interact with to create sound as though it were an instrument.

A interactive sculpture as large-scale musical instrument as defined for this project:

1. Anyone can walk up to it and, without instruction, make the piece make sound
2. It is possible that through practice someone could become more proficient creating sound with it

For example, consider a piano or guitar. Anyone can sit at a piano or hold a guitar and easily make it generate sound without explanation but with time, practice, and some additional information the person can improve what they create with the instrument. The project asks: what happens if we apply these expectations to large-scale interactive experiences?

Course Developed by:

Alex Braidwood, Director of Graduate Education and Associate Professor, Graphic Design
Vyankatesh (Vee) Chinchalkar, Assistant Teaching Professor of Industrial Design
Dr. Peter Walker, AK Studio Founding Artist
Sam Johnson, Creative Production Advisor

Information about the interdisciplinary teams of graduate and undergraduate students from Graphic Design, Industrial Design, and Architecture can be found here.

Learning Outcomes

• Work collaboratively with an interdisciplinary group that includes art professionals, researchers, and designers.
• Develop a publicly accessible interactive work that visually and sonically engages an underused space in collaboration with an Iowa community.
• Explore the development of new, experiential knowledge through engaging with new creative processes.

The Charrette Prompt

Students were divided into interdisciplinary pairs and given the prompt to design and build an experimental instrument that they would eventually play in the recording studio.

Students had 30 minutes to meet in pairs and sketch out ideas for different ways sounds could be created and controlled using found objects. Each pair was given $20 to spend at a massive thrift store on their primary materials. Other materials they found were fair game and basic hardware was provided.

Over the course of the week, design teams worked with AK Studio and Sam Johnson to iterate and build their experimental instruments before heading into the studio for their recording sessions at the end of the week.