Meyer Sound arrives at Jewish Museum
Published: WORSHIP
US: Are We There Yet?, a provocative new exhibition at San Francisco’s Contemporary Jewish Museum, fully immerses visitors in the inquisitive tradition of Jewish culture. Created by Ken Goldberg and Gil Gershoni and subtitled 5,000 Years of Answering Questions with Questions, this ‘reactive sound environment’ employs a custom-programmed robotic camera to track movements of visitors through the gallery.
The camera’s data then instructs a Meyer Sound D-Mitri digital audio platform to play back pre-recorded questions, with the enquiries progressing through a three-dimensional sound field of Meyer Sound loudspeakers while always keeping step with the designated visitors.
Recorded by a variety of voices, the questions interrogate visitors through a 16-channel surround system of Meyer Sound self-powered loudspeakers. Twelve MM-4XP miniature loudspeakers are placed around the perimeter of the floor, six legacy UPM-1 loudspeakers are set overhead while bass is supplemented by dual MM-10 miniature subwoofers. The heart of the system is the D-Mitri digital audio platform, which incorporates Wild Tracks audio playback and proprietary SpaceMap multichannel panning for dynamic shifting of the questioning voices among multiple loudspeakers for the immersive, intelligent tracking effect.
‘We originally envisioned a very simple assignment of tracks to individual speakers,’ remarked Gilad Gershoni, the sound designer for the project. ‘But when we learned about D-Mitri, we realized we could blend tracks between speakers. The questions would dynamically float through space, adding yet another dimension to the concept.’
The MM-4XP self-powered loudspeakers proved critical for managing sounds in the soaring, asymmetrical space of the museum’s Yud Gallery. ‘The acoustics were very challenging, with hard reflective surfaces,’ added Mr Gershoni. ‘The MM-4XPs were perfect for working within the unique architecture of the gallery.’
Are We There Yet? is open to visitors to the Contemporary Jewish Museum throughout July.