Invisible Schemnitz (2013)

In the town of Schemnitz, there is a spring of the river Schemnitz (merging with Ipeľ river) that is 54,6 km long, and almost its whole flow is currently underneath the town (serving as sewerage collector), surfacing only in the lower part of the town. In the times of the town establishment, it was flowing on the surface and gave the town its name.

The artwork Invisible Schemnitz is a three-minute sound recording reproduced by means of public announcement system in the whole town of Schemnitz at those places where the river flows below the surface. It reacts to the vague notion of the river as such and to its presence / non-presence in the streets of the town. The recording of the flow sound was made at the place where the water is led underground and at the places where it comes back to the surface again in the lower part of the town. The recording contains the sounds of a weak intake flow, then it continuously overlaps with the sound of intake/outtake and ends with the sound of the outtake of water from the town.