One-Bit Love is an interactive, musical sculpture by Noah Vawter originally run in Art Interactive (Cambridge, MA) as part of the Collision 7 show (April 2005), curated by Jack Bacharach and Dan Paluska.
It was later part of Space538's gallery show in Portland, Maine during Plugged in from March 3rd through March 20th, 2006, curated by Nat Sherman.
It is based on Noah Vawter's research into the musical expressiveness and variations of 1-bit waveforms...as well as some religious ideas....and a conversation with a mysterious lab visitor.
To respond to the many who have asked: "No, there is no laptop hidden behind the piece." The 5"x5" board inside the small portal window generates all the music. Visitors to the gallery can worship the sound by listening to the music, laying their hands on the 8-foot resonating instrument body, modulating the sounds with the large, velvet knobs and congregating around it.
The sculpture acts as a totem or altar where fans of this new/old style of music can take part in worship.
It is difficult to experience some parts of the worship over the net, like the resonance of the instrument body, and the interactivity of the controls, but you can still take part in celebrating the sound by playing this mp3.
The decorations on the instrument body allude to the (admittedly remote)
possibility that ancient people used drums made of copper and zinc, connected to
vats of tomato juice to send high-powered pulses of radio energy in
order to communicate with others, perhaps even their creator. These
pulses may still be travelling in space, resonating around in the
asteroid belt.
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