Fu(n)ga, photo: Tiziano Derme & Nadine Schütz, 2024
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Fu(n)ga

Tiziano Derme (IT), Nadine Schütz (CH)

Polyphonic feedback and spatialization between fungal growth and sound

Fu(n)ga explores the relationship between fungal growth, CO2 and acoustic vibration through spatialization and experimental sonification. The experience includes three main components: developing an enzymatic fungal process under controlled conditions, monitoring CO2 from fungal respiration and using sound to enhance and transpose fungal growth patterns with and into audible cues. A network of sensors and transducers creates a polyphonic feedback process.

It combines acoustic stimulation of fungi (talking to fungi) and sonification of fungal respiration (listening to fungi) monitored in real-time and during experiments. A spatial audio system immerses visitors in the organic composition and incorporates their breathing. Like a musical fugue, this metabolic polyphony expands into an auditory landscape in which multiple voices and temporalities reflect each other. Fu(n)ga creates a new bio-sensory media domain that invites reflection on the role of CO2 as an intrinsic condition of life.

Bios

  • Photo: Clément Willemin, 2024

    Nadine Schütz

    CH

    Nadine Schütz is a sound architect, artist, and researcher based in Paris and Zürich. She explores auditory environments as creative scores that inform and direct their own transformation. Her installations, compositions, scenographies and performances connect space and listening, landscape and music, the human and the non-human. Nadine holds a PhD in landscape acoustics from ETH Zurich and is currently a guest composer at IRCAM-STMS at Centre Pompidou in Paris.

  • Photo: Pascal Walden

    Tiziano Derme

    IT

    Tiziano Derme is an architect and media artist exploring the relationship between design, emergent materials and biotechnology. He is co-founder and director of MAEID (Büro für Architektur und transmediale Kunst). Currently, he is a visiting scientist at EMPA, researching enzymatic processes based on filamentous fungi. Tiziano is also a PhD researcher at ETH Zürich, in the Chair for Digital Building Technologies (dbt), Institute of Technology in Architecture (ITA).

Credits

Institutional partners:
ETH-Zürich Digital Building Technologies (dbt), Future Cities Laboratory (FCL) Global

Collaborators:
MAEID – Büro für Architektur & multimediale Kunst
ECHORA – Landscape Acoustics & Sound Architecture
Audio software development: Mathieu Preux, Advice: Manuel Poletti
Controlled environments hardware and software development: Che Wei Lin, Tobias Hartmann

The project has been produced in the frame of the ArTS Production Grant for Swiss Artists supported by the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia.
Presented with the kind support of the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia.