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«At best, the walls act unsound and the exterior space is heard inside in the interior one.» – Robert Lippok
A conversation between Robert Lippok (RL), Inke Arns (IA) and Dieter Daniels (DD), conducted on July 5, 2004 within the »Sound & Vision« Series at the HGB Leipzig.
IA: I would like to begin with a question about a concrete project, namely the »Kölner Brett« project. How was that conceived? Was the music you developed for this building integrated into it and played out there – or did you extract data directly from the building and then make an autonomous CD from it?
RL: It was an autonomous project. Arno Brandlhuber from b&k+ approached us about developing music for a house that he and his partner built. At the Architecture Fair in Orléans, he didn’t want it presented conventionally, with blueprints and photographs, but rather as a piece of music. So we got together, and he presented his concept to us. Then we studied the matter on location and finally developed the music for the building.
IA: Then it wasn’t merely integrated as a kind of public art?
RL: No. The house was already occupied. There were a few office and living spaces on the premises. The building’s basic concept is rather beautiful: a simple cube divided into twelve modules that lie one atop the other, at right angles, like two bricks. You can arrange the modules in any way you choose, and decide on using either one or all four units. The actual building, like its interior, is conceived as a module. Originally the idea was to have an entire series of such structures, fitted together in a row. Only simple materials were used during the construction phase, and the spaces were far from complete at the time. Not even bathrooms were available. There was heating, yes; but nothing else. Each user was free to decide how the spaces would be divided up. There was also some beautiful detail-work: for instance a wall made of green-toned Plexiglas that faces the street, with a phosphorescent finish in the Plexiglas that causes a slight afterglow whenever cars drive by. It doesn’t quite work, since the amount of phosphorescent material wasn’t properly calculated. To make it