Silence of the Arctic

Sound Installation & Performance - 2022 - 2024

Abisko (SE)

Silence of the Arctic is an immersive listening performance that begins with a live audio stream from Abisko, in northern Sweden. The work traces the migratory paths of birds toward Western Europe, following their dawn chorus as it unfolds across different landscapes. These field recordings in early spring 2022 from Western Europe to North Sweden.

In 2022, I began a deeper research project, Listening to Phenology, exploring what silence can offer as an ecosystem service and what it reveals about climate change. I have been listening to and recording quiet areas across Europe, often in borderlands where birds strongly shape the soundscape, capturing the unique acoustic fingerprints of each environment.

To deepen this exploration, I recorded dawn choruses along the birds’ migratory routes, mirroring the rhythm of spring and the blooming of cherry trees.
The journey passed through Normandy (France), Sonian Forest (Belgium), Oder Delta (Germany/Poland), Skagen (Denmark), Finnskogen and Hedmark (Norway), and finally arrived in Abisko (Sweden) in June, little bit after the yellow hammer,

The accompanying “silent map of Europe” visualizes the continent’s sound ecology:

Green areas represent regions with minimal ambient noise—quiet zones outside official nature reserves.
Red areas indicate areas with high ambient sound, dominated by human activity.

At the final point of the migration route, listeners could tune in to a live stream from a specialized microphone suspended in a tree near a scientific institute in Abisko during summer 2023. The microphone, housed in a custom-built wooden box reminiscent of Early Ears, continuously transmitted the region’s evolving soundscape bird migrations, insect activity, rumbling storms, and the stillness of frozen lakes melting into streams.

Amid these natural sounds, traces of human presence passing trains, mining operations, and tourism remained audible, reflecting the entanglement between human and natural worlds. Beneath it all lies a living ecosystem, inviting us to listen, learn, and reconnect with nature’s complex symphony from far.

This long-term fieldwork culminated in an immersive listening performance presented during the Week of Sound Festival at Flagey, Brussels, in 2024.

Press:
Silence of the Arctic (SE, BE) – VRT – 28 January 2024

Interview / Feature: The Drop on RTBF

Project supported by the Swedish Polar Research Secretariat, Naturum Abisko, Skagen Bird Observatory, Week of Sound (2024), and the Department of Culture, Youth and Media Flanders (2022).

Hedemark (NO)

Finnskogen (NO/SE)

Skagen Bird Observatory (DK)

Sonian Forest (BE)