Experiment

"The Space Voice of Open Mind" was performed on board the Japanese Experiment Module, Kibo.

All times are Japan Standard Time (JST)

JAXA Education Payload Observation (EPO) "The Space Voice of Open Mind"* was performed on board the Japanese Experiment Module, Kibo.

*Principal Investigator (PI): Noriyasu Fukushima, Emeritus Professor, Kyoto City University of Arts

The art theme intends to speculate about the source and the nature of "sound" which has developed human sensitivity through their perception and acoustic sense and to seek what the human sense is all about.

At midnight on April 16, 2012, on Kibo, the theme was performed by ESA Astronaut AndrｸJ・Kuipers and NASA Astronaut Donald Pettit.

Three-dimensional "Sound Emitting Object" was created to generate sound that can lead to imagine space voice and calmly affects mind. Knowing how the sound of the object hears and feels in space, possibilities of new artistic expressions and evolved space culture will be explored.

Special Message from PI, Prof. Noriyasu Fukushima, Emeritus Professor, Kyoto City University of Arts

From the preliminary phase of this experiment, both astronauts Kuipers and Pettit have been really interested in this experiment. On orbit they proactively generated their own space sound. As a result, we obtained wide range of space voice, its resonance, and active performance video, of which we will take full advantage for our future art.

Prof. Fukushima, PI, and associate Prof. Imanishi (Co-Investigator: CI) monitor the proceeding from the User Operations Area at the Tsukuba Space Center (Credit: JAXA)

Onboard experiment image
Floating Sound Emitting Object emits sound on Kibo (center, oval bell) and 3D microphone records the sound (left below) (Credit: Noriyasu Fukushima/JAXA)

*All times are Japan Standard Time (JST)