My latest work Sounding Peace, builds on an earlier Arts Council England funded R&D project, Soldier Stories. In 2023, we interviewed a small group of female veterans to talk about peacekeeping and female leadership in the forces, culminating in a test soundtrail What is the Sound of Peace?, geo- located at two locations in and around the National Army Museum, London.

For this new work, I am interviewing military veterans and their partners, both in person and online, through workshops and one-to one interviews. The veterans’ thoughts on peace and peacekeeping will form the prima materia of an installation which will begin to take shape in the coming months.

The initial interviews will be transcribed, edited and voiced by AI generated actors to anonymise the responses. These AI voices will accompanied by musical atmospheres and field recordings, with the work being spatialised at at a specialist immersive sound studio in the autumn, taking Buckminster Fuller’s concept of the Geodesic Dome as a visual inspiration.  The resulting sound sculpture will feature layers of sound (as sketched below), creating an immersive and interactive environment for the listener to walk into and explore from within.

The sculpture will be initially exhibited at Aldershot Military Museum in autumn 2025 using the ECHOES audio geolocation platform,  offering a unique way to re-imagine how we view memorialisation. Further opportunities for exhibition are currently being sought.

Our partners in this stage of the project are Hampshire Cultural Trust, Royal Irish Regiment Museum, Veterans and Families Institute, Anglia Ruskin University. The project is produced by O’Neill Ross. Watch this space for more news over the coming months.

Sounding Peace is supported by Arts Council England.