Biologist uses live yeast to create the world’s first “living record”
The electronic artist Mikael Hwang, who is also noted for his work as a scientist, has made the world’s first living electronic record by using live yeast cells.
Hwang, otherwise known as Psients, has created Signal, which is the first playable music format that includes and is mediated by a microorganism. An art exhibition has also been taking place in South Korea at the Paradise Art Lab Festival to celebrate the release of the EP.
Included with the record is a customised petri dish which houses the secret material, allowing the record to record the vibrations coming from the yeast cells and convert them into audio signals.
Hwang said of the project: “Clubs and dance floors are essential spaces for people to dance and enjoy music – that’s where my love of electronic music blossomed. I want to evolve from these places to exhibitions or galleries where music and sound can take on a different role; where people can listen, think, and reflect on their environments, rather than react to the immediacy of spaces, such as a club.”
Traditional vinyl records have their music physically etched into them, but Signals uses an entirely varying manufacturing process. Hwang has previously expressed his desire to further the research of living music, and he believes that electronic sound will at some point have a biological life.
Hwang is continuing his work of recording living organisms and converting the recordings into listenable music. Of Signal, he said, “Signal is a project at the intersection of biology, sound, and music: it is the first iteration of creating an instrument that is alive and also marks itself as the world’s first playable, living music media.”
He added, “Signal consists of three components – the installation, the object, and the music – and is inspired by biology lab practices of culturing microorganisms in petri dishes and my persistent love for electronic music.”
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