Stone Speaks with Artist, Lachlan Turczan
Sculpting, With Sound
Meeting Lachlan felt like beholding lighting in a bottle. One of the first things he shared with me when we met to discuss moving mountains, was that he loves to “dream with his eyes open”.
Naturally, had me at hello.
Lachlan Turczan is a Los Angeles based artist working with water, light and sound. He creates light artworks, fountain shows, and music videos that often explore natural phenomena and the visualization of sound. For over a decade, Lachlan has been developing a water-projector that creates ever-shifting, organic imagery similar to gazing into a fire or at the clouds. He has exhibited this work in museums and experimental film festivals across the United States, most notably at SFMoMA in 2018.
His work is inventive, poetic, and designed to give viewers the opportunity to fully engage with their imagination. I invite you to sink into this dialogue and be transported into the realms water x sound.
You can find out more about Lachlan’s work here:
https://www.instagram.com/lachlanturczan/
MIRROR SPEAK
'Mirror Speak' is an artwork created for the California Botanic Garden.
A mirrored sheet of stainless steel is mounted to submersible speakers that softly hum beneath a shallow reflecting pool. The speakers play a 13 hertz tone, which is the resonate frequency of the basin. This infrasonic frequency reverberates throughout the metal and causes cymatic wave patterns to form on the surface of the water. The cymatics start off as small wavelets but slowly build upon each other in a positive feedback loop to create larger currents that emanate across the basin. The result is a reflecting pool that appears to have a tidal current of its own, a swath of water reminiscent of the deep ocean waves.
From Visual Atelier 8: “Lachlan is interested in creating engaging experiences that pose alternatives to our increasingly digitally mediated landscapes. Using sound as a sculptural tool, he creates cymatic patterns in water to form liquid lenses. These lenses are kinetic, responsive, and ephemeral means of focusing and refracting light. Whether distorting the reflected light of the sky by day, or a powerful beam from a spotlight by night, these experiences of cymatic patterns provide the public with an opportunity to explore fascinating natural phenomena.”
EXPO FOUNTAIN, Dubai, 2020
“The universe exists solely in waves of motion… there is nothing other than vibration” - Walter Russell.
INVITATION
EXERCISE: L I G H T P L A Y
A meditation on dreaming from Lachlan Turczan
Find a tree & lie beneath it on a sunny afternoon. Close your eyes and let the dappling light play, creating a little world of color in the back of your eyes.