Tomáš Šenkyřík
Soundscapes of Brno, Human And Non-Human Sounds

The exhibition presents the result of a time-lapse survey of the soundscape of Brno. Tomáš Šenkyřík intuitively looks mainly at places on the borders where different zones interact, as defined by the American musician and sound ecologist Bernie Krause, i.e. biophony (the sound of non-human animals), geophony (natural sounds of non-biological origin, such as rain, wind or the sounds of the Svratka and Svitava rivers) and anthropophony (sounds created by humans). These include, for example, green belts, transition areas between the road and the forest or park.

The recording started on the outskirts of Brno and gradually the author approached the city centre. He investigated the acoustic situation of each location, how the sounds of human civilization and the non-human world interact and whether there can be mutual interaction within the human dominance. How the various more or less audible vibrations caused by human activity affect the animal inhabitants of the city? What happens when an overflying plane or truck passing through the Brno ring road forms an accompaniment to the spring song of the blackbird?

In a sense, the recording follows a timeline with a peak in spring, when the bird choruses of blackbirds or songbirds are heard. One of the sites that the author has been researching for a long time is Lužánky Park - one of the oldest parks in Brno, a place of great biodiversity and also one of the border locations, immediately surrounded by residential areas and roads. Here the urban chorus meets the bird's acoustic niche and impressive sound contrasts occur. Other recordings come from the wintering grounds of the ravens at Red Hill or from Petrov, where the voices of the homing pigeons mix with the sounds of passing trains at dawn.

The sound installation presents us with surprising tonal layers of meaning, it wants us to listen more carefully, to "open" our ears so that we are able to find sonic beauty where we might not look for it.

The visual accompaniment in the form of a minimalist video drawing, generated directly from the sound recording, was created by Michal Kindernay.

Tomáš Šenkyřík graduated in musicology and aesthetics, worked as an ethnomusicologist at the Roma Museum in Brno, and is now the deputy mayor of Židlochovice. He composes electroacoustic music and makes field recordings mainly of natural environments. He focuses on sound phenomena of the interconnected cultural and natural spheres. He is a member of the group called Skupina and the international network CENSE.

opening photo: Tomáš Šenkyřík
photo: Barbora Trnková