Towards an Auditory Representation of Complexity

In applications of sonification, the information inferred by the sonification strategy applied often supersedes the amount of information which can be retrieved by the ear about the object of sonification. This paper focuses on the representation of complex geometric formation through sound, drawing on the development of an interactive installation sonifying escape time fractals as an example. The terms “auditory emergence and formation” are introduced and an attempt is made to interpret them for music composition, data display and information theory. The example application,. “Audio Fraktal”, is a public installation in the permanent exhibition of the Museum for Media Art at ZKM, Karlsruhe. The design of the audiovisual display system that allows the shared experience of interactive spatial auditory formation is described. The work was produced by the author at the Institute for Music and Acoustics at ZKM, Karlsruhe.