A view of the 3D Sonic Installation (105+dB) at Al Ahmed Square, Souq Waqif which is part of fifth Qatar-British Festival.
To every football fan, watching a football match live in a stadium is the most exhilarating experience. Virtually the same experience is brought to Souq Waqif through the 105+dB sonic installation which premiered yesterday.
A first-of-its-kind aural art piece in Qatar, 105+dB, which refers to the sound level at which individual voices are lost in a crowd, is a public art installation created by Invisible Flock, a Leeds-based interactive arts studio, as a highlight of the fifth annual Qatar British Festival.
For this large-scale installation, 12 speakers are positioned around Al Ahmed Square in which a 25-minute recording of football fans chanting and cheering during a football match last September 14 at Grand Hamad Stadium is played providing passers-by a unique way of enjoying public art beyond the usual visual dimension.
“On September 14 this year, we recorded a football match at the Grand Hamad Stadium in Doha. We placed microphones around the entire pitch pointing at the fans so that we were able to take an exact sound footprints from that stadium and from the experience of the fans during the match and we’ve taken it and we’ve put it here in Souq Waqif with 12 speakers, so you can walk through the installation like a sound sculpture,” Catherine Baxendale, Creative Producer at Invisible Flock, told The Peninsula yesterday.
Catherine Baxendale, Creative Producer from Invisible Flock at the 3D Sonic Installation (105+dB) at Al Ahmed Square, Souq Waqif, which is part of fifth Qatar British Festival. Pic: Qassim Rahmatullah/The Peninsula
As one of the main tourist destinations in the country, Souq Waqif is a perfect choice to set the installation up.
“We looked at a lot of different venues; it needs to be a large space so that you can walk around it but is seems to fit really well here in Souq Waqif because the songs that have been sung during the match are very traditional and they fit quite well with the setting here in Souq Waqif. Also it can be positioned in the middle of the city so people can walk through the installation almost by mistake, they kind of come across it,” Baxendale.
The piece is about place, participation and identity and creating a sound installation like 105+dB achieves a purpose as football is something that unites people in this part of the world. Setting up the installation in an in an unusual public space further creates curiosity and interaction among people.
“The idea behind this piece is basically making an invisible sculpture in a place where it shouldn’t be. You are here in the city and you close your eyes and you find yourself in the middle of a stadium and it should be super realistic,” Ed Waring, Sound Artist at Invisible Flock, explained.
Invisible Flock had brought similar concept to the UK, France and Belgium but the Souq Waqif installation is unique, said Waring.
Ed Waring, Sound Artist from Invisible Flock at the 3D Sonic Installation (105+dB) at Al Ahmed Square, Souq Waqif, which is part of fifth Qatar British Festival. Pic: Qassim Rahmatullah/The Peninsula
“This piece doesn’t sound like any of the other game that we’ve recorded; it is so different from how games in Europe sounded. We think it could be a useful tool for showing visitors what makes football here unique,” he added.
Souq Waqif visitors have until Friday to experience 105+dB. Footballers from Al-Rayyan SC and Al-Arabi SC, will attend and meet and greet fans at 10am on Thursday.
The British Council is also hosting a 105+dB workshop today and tomorrow at government and international schools and an open to the public panel discussion on Art in the Public Realm on Wednesday at the Museum of Islamic Art.
A celebration of the long-standing relationship between Qatar and the UK, the fifth Qatar British Festival organised by the British Council in partnership with the British Embassy offers 20 live events concluding on December 12 with British Landscapes concert featuring award-winning UK violinist Savitri Grier and the Qatar Philharmonic Orchestra.
