MICRO-MOBILITIES

“Micro-mobility is a broad term for a growing category of transportation vehicles, including electric scooters and bicycles, that provide an alternative to traditional transportation (cars, trains, buses) in cities and communities. Micro-mobility services are usually “dockless”, leverage GPS and cellular connectivity to track vehicle locations, and are designed to fulfill first mile / last mile needs.”

From: ”Micro-Mobility”, American Library Association, January 8, 2019.
http://www.ala.org/tools/future/trends/micromobility

Micro-Mobilities investigates new alternatives in the city transportation systems in the context of evolving invisible environments and possible changes within the urban structures and soundscape connected to these processes.

The introduction of micro-mobility vehicles is an interesting change in the way of exploring the city among citizens and tourists. Experience of the street life, cityscape, passers-by and the sound environment accelerates from the pace of 5 km of a walk to 12 km or even 20 km per hour. 

At the same time, the emergence of first mile/last mile transportation vehicles – new quality in the urban environment – has raised questions about their meaning or impact on the surrounding, new emissions, safety use, hacking, and accidents rate. Each e-scooter is fed with a battery, equipped with GPS chips and a cellular connection. With real-time tracking, every ride, as well as information given about the rider, is recorded. Even unloaded or broken scooters broadcast their location to the GPS so that they can be found and collected for charging. Constantly emitting signals, e-vehicles became a noticeable source of electromagnetic radiation and energies within the urban environment.

Installation is based on data detected with a device for electromagnetic listening. The sound structure consists of recordings of electromagnetic fields produced by various abandoned micro-mobility devices. They were found in the bushes, parks, laying on the sidewalks, streets, by the entrance to the underground, shopping mall or by cemetery gates. Loudspeakers are placed in the exhibition space. Sound fades in and fades out in randomised time intervals.

set:
2024 – silent green Kulturquartier – as a part of More Strange Things group exhibition organized by Kunst und Medien UdK Berlin
2020 – Syntopia Festival for Electronic Art; Siros
2020 – Medienhaus UdK Berlin