Long Range Tracking – Deep in the Drake Passage
Víctor Mazón Gardoquis
Immersive audiovisual installation / composition, 80-minute loop / September 10–19, 2021
The immersive multichannel composition Long Range Tracking – Into the Depths of the Drake Passage explores the acoustics of underwater worlds in the southern regions of the Earth. Sounds from marine, scientific, and military ecosystems coexist side by side. Human-caused (anthropogenic) and human-independent (geogenic) acoustic phenomena are related to one another.
For this work, sounds from military, scientific, and homemade devices were recorded over 32 days aboard the military ship Aquiles XXI on a journey from Punta Arenas (Chile) to Antarctica. These include sonar refractions in the depths of the Drake Passage—a place where three continental plates and three oceans meet, making it one of the most unpredictable and dangerous locations on the planet for navigation.
Mazón Gardoqui’s work reveals the inaudible and invisible, seeks proximity to the inaccessible, and exposes the viewer to experiences of vulnerability and awareness. Perception and altered conditions are key concepts in his performances, realized through sound or light. He explores open-source hardware based on freely accessible blueprints, as well as experimental circuit design, and conducts seminars in various educational contexts covering device studies, speculative design, and experimental sensory applications. The work Long Range Tracking – Deep in the Drake Passage was specially developed for the 3D audio system at ZiMMT.