Sonic Fiction, or on Contemporary Audio-Sphere

Agnieszka Karpa

Abstract

Karpa analyses modern acoustic space which has come into being as a result of the development of electronic media. She explores the acoustic aspect of new digital environ­ments such as cyberspace, virtual reality and the Internet. By „acoustic space” or audio-hy­perspace she means first of all the electro-acoustic space of the Internet abounding in the living audio-data flows, sound files and a whole spectrum of interactive tools and audio actions, as well as music production which via application of electronic technologies is building virtual spaces. Karpa remarks that today’s music and the art of sound in general (especially electronic) is already treated not as a vehicle of the structuring of time but of space. Karpa describes new forms and phenomena that have appeared with the development of electronic media; sonic sculptures, body movement-operated interfaces, hyper instru­ments and the new sound treatment techniques like tumtablism, scratching, the provocative activities of the Plagiators and Plunderphonics (based on audio „piracy”), ambient music, jungle and hip-hop.