Timo Kahlen

About

Sound sculptor and media artist Timo Kahlen (*1966) chooses to work with the ephemeral: with wind and steam, with light and shade, with pixels and dust, with sound, noise and vibration.

His work has been shortlisted for various renowned scholarships, including his project “Haptic Sound“ (Stiftung Kulturwerk der VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2020), the new book “Timo Kahlen: Immaterials. Holding My Breath. Sculpting Sound. Net Art. Works with Wind. Light & Shade. 1986-2021“ (Senate for Culture and Europe, Berlin 2021), “Stiftung Kunstfonds“ (Bonn 2010), the German national “Sound Art Prize“ (2006), the “Kahnweiler Prize for Sculpture“ (2001) and the “Prize for Young European Photographers“ (1989); and has received critical recognition at more than 250 exhibitions of contemporary media art since the mid-1980s, including invitations to “Flügelschlag. Insekten in der Zeitgenössischen Kunst“ (Bad Homburg 2019),“LAND_SCOPE“ (Munich 2018), “Back into the Future of Photography“ (Frankfurt 2016), “Sound Art: Sound as a Medium of Art“ (ZKM | Karlsruhe 2012), “Tonspur_expanded: The Loudspeaker“ (Vienna 2010), “MANIFESTA 7: Scenarios“ (Italy 2008), “Wireless Experience“ (ISEA Helsinki 2004), “Zeitskulptur: Volumen als Ereignis“ (Linz 1997) and his solo exhibition “Timo Kahlen: Works with Wind“, inaugurating the Kunst-Werke Berlin in 1991.

Kahlen holds a Master of Fine Arts degree (Meisterschüler award) from the Berlin University of the Arts (formerly Hochschule der Künste Berlin), where he studied experimental photography with professor Dieter Appelt, and held a lectureship in Visual Media and Video Art from 1993 to 1998. Since 1985 to the present, he assists the work of the Ruine der Künste Berlin, “a private space for material and immaterial arts“ in Berlin.

In Timo Kahlen's interactive film and sound projections, 21 works of net art (2005 - 2020), complex and subtle compositions of text, image, sound and vibration are generated - always different and live - according to the varying position, direction and speed, and voluntary pauses of the computer mouse, as it hovers and clicks on the touch-sensitive visual surface. Invisible, multiple embedded layers of sound, noise and vibration form complex acoustic compositions, as visitors & users explore the individual works, and their mouse cursor meanders across the visual projections.

See a signature documentary (HD video, 24:24 min, stereo) of Timo Kahlen's interactive film and sound projections at https://vimeo.com/441602551.

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With the end of browser support for the interactive Flash Player

on December 31, 2020 all of Timo Kahlen's works of net art

have finally vanished from the internet. They have become

invisible & inaudible.

However, even today, by simply installing the Ruffle add-on

in your browser (see ruffle.rs), Kahlen's interactive works

can be re-animated (emulated) and experienced on your device.

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The original interactive works are visible and audible at :

staubrauschen.de/audiodust/ (Audio Dust, 2011)

staubrauschen.de/articulate/ (articulate, 2018)

staubrauschen.de/carpe/ (Carpe Diem, 2011)

staubrauschen.de/dioden/ (Diodenzwitschern, 2006)

staubrauschen.de/fromscratch/ (From Scratch, 2011)

staubrauschen.de/drama/ (Drama, 2011)
staubrauschen.de/error/ (/error/, 2020)

staubrauschen.de/in-medias-res/ (in medias res, 2020)

staubrauschen.de/insignificant/ (insignificant, 2020)

staubrauschen.de/migrtaion/ (migrtaion,2016)

staubrauschen.de/numbers/ (Numbers, 2011 or 2013)

staubrauschen.de/ping/ (ping tschä tschä, 2005)

staubrauschen.de/rohschnitt/ (Rohschnitt,2016)

staubrauschen.de/source/ (Source (postfactual), 2017)

staubrauschen.de/signal/ (Signal-To-Noise, 2011)

staubrauschen.de/sounddrift/ (Sound Drift, 2005 with Ian Andrews)

staubrauschen.de/mistakes/ (The Essence of Art, 2016)

staubrauschen.de/unstable/ (/unstable/, 2017)

staubrauschen.de/delete/ (Undo/Delete, 2011)

staubrauschen.de/ur/ (UR, 2006)

staubrauschen.de/compatible/ (YesNo, 2011; re-released 2016)

All works documented here collection and courtesy of the artist, the Ruine der Künste Berlin, ZKM Karlsruhe, Cornell University, FILE Festival and Akademie der Künste Berlin.

All copyrights: Timo Kahlen / VG Bild-Kunst 2005-2022

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