Soundscape Installation and Tree Decoration 2021, Milano, Italy
Once November has passed, Christmas gets closer and closer. The lights go up in the streets, twinkling in all sorts of colors as night falls, reflecting on the masked faces of passers-by. Even when the north wind blows with the coldness of snow and ice, we still feel a fairy-tale sense of peace and joy.
Everyone loves Christmas.
The installation was inspired by the cool winds of the season and we wanted to give to the viewer an aesthetically pleasing experience of a cold winter's day. At the same time, we wanted to reflect the harmony between the natural landscape and human festivity: the ribbon decorations hanging from the branches and trunks of the trees were made by hand using recycled materials; we also minimised damage to the trees during the setting up process.
Sound Design
We composed an original soundtrack to be played through a speaker on the tree, creating an ambient windy but Christmas feeling music. When there’s some wind blowing, the audience can both see the dynamic changes of the stripes, the lights at night, and listen to the light music playing in the background.
The composition is made of three sections: the first is an opening created by the piano playing arpeggios over the circle of fifths, interlaced with wind sounds, creating a delightful and harmonious yet open and cold feeling; the second contains cheerful music elements played by a music box, creating a more childish and happy feeling; the third, finally, is a blurred version of the first section, where the wind blows away the musical elements, as winter passes.
The installation, as a whole, acts as a bridge between human solitude and fragility against cold winter and nature, and human warmth connecting people hearts through festivity.
- Event: Polimi Tree-athlon Contest 2021
- Exhibition Time: December 3th to 18th, 2021
- Locations:
- Bonardi Campus, Milano, Italy
- Giuriati Sport Center, Milano, Italy
- Music & Decorations: Matteo Bernardini, Yilin Zhu
