Flow Over Water Borders at Staatsoper, Berlin

Intervening with Panke River water

Flow Over Water Borders
Sound Installation

14th and 15th June 2019
Junge Staatsoper
Berlin

How does the water change when people act upon it? 

How do we personally change when we interact with other people?

We all have borders. Learning how to navigate them is important. Wether we are overcoming personal hurdles or opening up to others, the process creates changes in both ourselves and others.

“Flow Over Water Borders” at the Staatsoper Berlin, explores the parallel between urban life for young people and the changes occurring in water as it passes through the city. The sound installation explores the meaning of boundaries, the fluid nature of the self and the eternal navigation of the individual as part of society.

Audio recordings were created with class 7c during a co-creation workshop investigating the Panke River in Berlin Wedding as part of the project “DIY Hack the Panke” (Art Laboratory Berlin). Recordings were taken using special instruments developed by the artist, Kat Austen, which generate sounds from the measurement of chemical properties of water.

Part of Wasserklang Orchester.

NB: Entry to the exhibition is only available to Theatre ticket holders.

Wasserklang Orchester workshops DIY Hack the Panke with Gustav-Freytag-Schule

Hydrophone recordings of Berlin waters

Kat will be working during the week of 20th May with students from the Gustav-Freytag-Schule to make sound recordings from water using her hacked scientific instruments and DIY hydrophones, as part of the DIY Hack the Panke project. These recordings will be composed, along with piano compositions with the school’s Klavier AG, into a sound installation at the Berlin Staatsoper in June 2019.

Sensing Water at ZEM Potsdam

Using a hacked pH meter to listen to the acidity of water

13th-14th May 2019
ZeM, Potsdam and surrounds

Kat Austen will be working with participants from the ZeM SENSING PhD programme to explore the human relationship with water using artistic research techniques that meld together embodied explorations with those mediated by sensing equipment. This workshop introduces participants to two artistic research methods that make use of scientific equipment and embodied techniques to connect with water, and facilitates the exploration of local water using these methods.