Pierce Warnecke & Matthew Biederman residency report
In June 2025, the artists Pierce Warnecke and Matthew Biederman spent a week in the forests, bogs, and nature reserves of east-central Latvia. Guided by botanist Līga Pentjuša (from the Latvian State Forest Research Institute “Silava”), they conducted botanical surveys using photogrammetry and field-recording techniques.
In 1978, Richard Goldstein authored an article entitled “A Terrain Reader” in the “Byte Book of Computer Music” where he described a novel audio synthesis technique whereby custom software could “read” a topographic representation as a means to create sound, thereby establishing the field of “wave terrain synthesis”. For their work in Latvia, the artists propose to continue this trajectory while using current remote sensing technologies in the creation of these phytomorphic microtopographies, to generate three-dimensional forms (point clouds). This process will be followed by a tool/instrument building phase using MaxMSP and Touch Designer to develop specific digital instruments to visualize, sonify and process the datasets in real-time. Finally, the process will transition into realizing the final form of their research and work on the project.
The materials gathered will be used to create an audiovisual work titled "Phytomorphic Topographies", which will be presented at the Skaņu Mežs festival in October 2025.
