The presentations culminate the AIR S+T+ARTS project, co-funded by the European Commission, in which international artists have worked in collaboration with experts from the scientific and technological fields
BSC has been one of the main pillars of AIR S+T+ARTS, leading the scientific part of three of the most innovative projects of this edition: Impossible Larynx: An Artistic Research on Modeling Voices, in which the artist Maria Arnal creates a digital twin of her phonatory apparatus capable of reproducing all the possibilities of a human voice; Breathing Architecture, in which the Italian artist Filippo Nassetti explores human breathing through biomimetic architectures, and Electric Atmospheres, in which the Dutch designer Richard Vijgen shows the invisible landscapes created by the electromagnetic waves emitted by our cell phones.
On October 26 and 27, the Port of Badalona will host the culmination of the AIR S+T+ARTS project, a pioneering initiative that connects artists, scientists and technologists in a unique collaboration on a European scale. This event marks the end of the artistic residencies of the AIR S+T+ARTS project, co-funded by the European Commission, and is part of the program of The Gate Festival, organized by the Fundació Èpica La Fura dels Baus. The meeting represents a unique opportunity to discover how science and art have collaborated closely to generate innovations that bring scientific knowledge to society in a creative and accessible way.
The AIR S+T+ARTS project is part of the S+T+ARTS (Science, Technology & The Arts) platform, which aims to encourage collaboration between science and art to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time, such as climate change, urbanization and the integration of advanced technologies in our daily lives. This year, the project has brought together ten international artists who, after a rigorous selection process, have worked together with renowned technological research centers, such as Barcelona Supercomputing Center - Centro Nacional de Supercomputación (BSC-CNS), SONY Computer Science Laboratories and High Performance Computing Center Stuttgart (HLRS).
The projects developed during these residencies explore topics as varied as the human voice, electromagnetic waves and breathing, creating a bridge between scientific research and artistic expression.
The program of the artistic residencies focuses on the concept of air, understood not only as the invisible substance that we breathe, but the concept goes far beyond that. Air addresses both visible and invisible elements, complements our senses and connects with the environment. It is closely linked to the human body and is vital for verbal communication, the existence of sound and, consequently, language and logical thinking. At the same time, the residency program has focused on two main themes: cross-species resilient urban ecosystems and human ecosystems of artificial intelligence, presenting a unique opportunity for artists to collaborate at the intersection of art, science and technology.
BSC gives voice and shape to the fusion of science and art
BSC has been one of the fundamental pillars of the AIR S+T+ARTS project, leading the scientific part of three of the most innovative projects of this edition. With more than ten years of experience driving the intersection between art and science through its Art+Science Driven Innovation line, BSC has used its supercomputing capabilities to develop new tools and visualizations that allow artists and scientists to collaborate on projects that address complex phenomena from innovative perspectives.
One of the projects in which BSC has been directly involved is Impossible Larynx, developed by singer and songwriter Maria Arnal in collaboration with a team of BSC researchers. Arnal, known for her ability to explore the human voice and its collective dimensions, has worked with the BSC to create an artificial intelligence tool capable of extending the limits of the human voice. The project, led by scientist Fernando Cucchietti and his team at the BSC Data Analytics and Visualization Group, has developed a digital twin of her vocal tract, allowing it to simulate and reproduce the infinite possibilities of a human voice.
"These kind of projects are really motivating because they combine technological challenges, sometimes defined and sometimes yet to be discovered, with an application that is not purely technical, but includes emotional components and is appreciated by general public. This means that success is not always measured by technical precision, but by the openness and unpredictability of the discovery process,” explains Cucchietti.
The project integrates voice processing models and a 3D visualization of the vocal tract, which responds in real time to external voice input. This tool is not only an innovation in the musical field, but represents a new way of exploring the voice as a digital instrument. Thanks to the supercomputing capacity of BSC, it has been possible to create a prototype web app that allows the user to interact with the voice in a completely new way: singing, speaking and even writing: the application modulates the voice according to the parameters of the vocal tract simulated in real time.
The collaboration between Maria Arnal and BSC originates from a previous joint project, Maria CHOIR, funded by the Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology (FECYT). This work was exhibited at the Centro de Cultura Contemporánea de Barcelona (CCCB), within the exhibition IA: Artificial Intelligence, and has been awarded this year by the European Commission with the S+T+ARTS Honorary Mention at the Ars Electronica festival, one of the most recognized international events on art, technology and society. The new Impossible Larynx project has opened up new avenues of research in AI-augmented speech synthesis, with potential applications beyond music, exploring how technology can influence artistic creativity and deep understanding of the human voice. Impossible Larynx was first presented as part of Sónar+D, with great success; at The Gate Festival, the public will have the opportunity to live an immersive experience with this interactive tool.
Exploring breathing and electromagnetic waves with supercomputing
BSC has also played a prominent role in two other scientific projects that will be on view at the festival. One of the projects showing the fusion between science and art is Electric Atmospheres, created by Dutch artist Richard Vijgen. The project highlights the invisible presence of electromagnetic waves emitted by everyday devices such as our cell phones. With the support of BSC, Vijgen has used advanced computational simulations to visualize how these waves interact with urban environments, transforming the architectural landscape of cities such as Barcelona or Rotterdam.
Through artistic visualization, Electric Atmospheres offers a completely new way of understanding the technology around us and its influence on the space we inhabit.
“The scientific part of Electric Atmospheres is based on advanced computational simulation to understand the interaction between architecture and electromagnetic waves in urban environments. This integration of science and art has broadened my understanding of how these fields can complement each other and enrich each other, offering an important platform for scientific dissemination,” says Octavio Castillo, a BSC researcher involved in this project.
Another project is Breathing Architecture, a project created by Italian artist Filippo Nassetti, which explores human breathing from an architectural point of view. Through the use of advanced supercomputing techniques, Nassetti has worked with a team of scientists led by BSC researcher Beatriz Eguzkitza to shape and simulate synthetic breathing architectures inspired by biomimetics. This project opens new perspectives not only in the field of architecture, but also in the design of environments that better respond to the needs of the human body, offering aesthetic and functional insights into the biological processes that regulate respiration.
“Exploring the potential of multidisciplinary collaboration to drive scientific and technological innovation has proven to be an absolute success. At the beginning we didn't know how far we could go, but the fluidity with which the whole project has developed has been impressive. The biomimetic solutions proposed by Filippo have exceeded all my expectations, and his visualizations are not only aesthetic, but have helped us to better understand the behavior of fluids and to communicate with other disciplines, such as the health sector,” says Eguzkitza.
In addition to these three projects, BSC has also supported in research, to a greater or lesser extent, Antoine Bertin (Making all voices of the city Heard, a project that uses AI as a tool to better understand the multitude of non-human sounds that inhabit urban landscapes), Michail Rybakov, Jonathan Reus, Natan Singiglia and the Uncharted Limbo collective.
A platform for dialogue between science, art and society
The Gate Festival, organized by the Fundació Èpica La Fura dels Baus, is not only a space for artistic presentation, but also a platform for interdisciplinary dialogue between scientists, artists and technologists. During the next 26th and 27th of October, the public will have the opportunity to explore how artists have collaborated with more than twenty scientific experts to develop projects that address social, technological and environmental challenges.
Thus, the Port de Badalona will become the meeting point between art, science and technology, thanks to the support of BSC and other leading centers, such as RCR Lab-A and SONY Computer Science Laboratories. This event offers a unique opportunity for all those interested in seeing how scientific innovation and artistic exploration can work together to address the great challenges of our society.
Picture: BSC scientists and artists who participated in the AIR S+T+ARTS project (Mario Ejarque/BSC)