Nolan Lem: Babbling Brook

Nolan Lem, artist and researcher, creates a soundscape of a stream composed by robotically controlled keyboards as they “talk” about different sounds and forms of water. Their “conversation”, generated by artificial intelligence, becomes the primary material, which when multiplied sounds like a flowing stream. In addition to the keyboard ensemble, there are also terrariums, old CRT screens, TV sets and speakers, which together create their own small ecosystem – the artificial nature of the Babbling Brook. Nolan describes the installation as a sonic meditation on the parallel “streams of consciousness” of the 21st century – as the keyboards babble about the sound of water, they unintentionally produce it.

The installation can be viewed until 12 April 2025, during the Oris House of Architecture opening hours.

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During the Biennale, three installations explore the theme of Broken Relationships through the prism of technology and nature. Norwegian composer and multimedia artist Tine Surel Lange explores the interplay of sound and movement in the framework of magical realism, and for MBZ 33, she creates a world in which Nature writes a Dear Humanity farewell letter. American artist and researcher Nolan Lem builds interactive systems in which he examines the behaviour and habits of a collective. In his latest work, he will build an artificial ecosystem of the Babbling Brook within a similar framework. Croatian conceptual artist Hrvoje Hiršl questions the limits of human perception and senses in the era of technological progress. In a new segment of The Limit of Representation series, titled Dimensions of the Line, he explores the purpose of the spaces we construct and inhabit.