Created by Ralf Baecker and installed for the 13th Momentum Biennial, The Collapse of a Microcosm is a site-specific sound and light installation that engages in a continuous dialogue with its environment—a living archive of the present as it fades into the past.
The installation is comprised of a network of 90 artificial memory modules. Each module (custom designed PCB) is equipped with RGB LEDs, and a set of photosensors responsive to both visible and non-visible ligh. These modules are arranged in a multi-layered loop and each one is fitted with a miniature speaker. Light sensed from the environment or from the previous modules is propagated with a specific delay to the next module. Sunlight, the shifting ambient light of changing weather, and the movements of human bodies within the gallery are all registered, translated and passed on in a recursive chain.
Throughout the day, each unit accumulates and transmits traces of its environment, forming a fragile, nonlinear memory that reverberates into both night and day. Light and sound pulse through the space, creating a temporal field where presence leaves an imprint and is gently re-inscribed into the system. Each memory vector emits a distinct tone, producing a sonic imprint—a contrast between past and present. This creates a layered, disharmonic soundscape that evolves and develops, where artificial and natural rhythms converge.
Ralf Baecker
The result is an audio-visual experience that connects time, sensation, and technological cognition. The installation does not merely reflect change—it embodies it. The human presence is not external to the system, but part of its sensory ecology. As visitors move through the space, their shadows and movements are absorbed into the installation’s memory loops, where they are transformed into sound and vision—into data that listens and remembers.
Each custom printed PCB includes a ESP32 module, 4 channel high power LED, infrared, UV and daylight photosensors. The backend is made using Processing.
Project Page | Ralf Baecker | Momentum
Produced by Studio Ralf Baecker with the help from Boun Kim (Assembly). Video documentation by Lars-Ingar Bragvin Andreas, Texas Reklamebyrå. Additional photos by Eivind Lauritzen, Galleri F 15
