JCousteau offices of the world of silence And yet, it may be more appropriate to refer to the sea as the world of darkness. The ocean is full of the sounds, of echoes and voices that resonate from the surface to the depths. Science, especially in the last 20 years with the emergence of digital tools, has told us that sound plays a fundamental role in the relationships between different forms of marine life. Thanks to the dozens of studies on the propagation of sound in the water, up to five times faster than in the air, to acoustic biology and the invention and evolution of devices such as hydrophones we know such fascinating things as that Whale songs can become fashionable and jump through the different seas as if they were a summer hit or that these animals hear other specimens of their species thousands of kilometers away.
But do we really understand what impact the sound pollution of radars and ships has in these marine species? Or what does he feel and listen to a sperm whale 2,000 meters deep? These are some of the questions that come to our heads when visiting “Echoes of the Ocean”, an exhibition of the Telefónica Foundation which can be visited until September 7. The exhibition unites art, science and technology to convert this exhibition space into “a huge listening device that invites us to establish a connection with other inhabitants of the planet through emotion and empathy,” the entity explains.
More than answering these questions, the exhibition invites us to enter the depths of the sea. And he succeeds, above all, in his centerpiece, entitled “Seeing Echoes in the Mind of the Whale.” This immersive space, with its 12 giant screens, combines Mar Mar sounds captured by The scientific group of Bioacoustic Applications Laboratory of the Polytechnic University of Catalonia with images generated by AI and Reprepredated byMarshmallow laser feast, The artistic collective English Known to exploreThe natural world from feeling. The resultIt is almost a meditation, a personal trip in which the visitor immerses himself in the water. Almost in The surface, barely put your feet in this exhibition space, is one with coral reefs, species very sensitive to sound. Below, the presence and echoes of the minular dolphins or the gray whales are imposed. Already in the depth, where the sunlight barely arrives and everything is gloom and vibration, almost the silhouettes of the sperm whales do. We are in a room and, at the same time, almost 2,000 meters under the sea.
Thus, science sneaks through an envelope artistic experience to reach the Plankton temple, A room where a spectacular sculpture composed of 200 pieces of blown glass that rise and fall creating a color game and shapes. Pure sensory experience that reminds us that plankton in its rhythmic trips from the depths to the surface of the ocean, support marine life and generate 50% of the oxygen we breathe on earth.
The immersive experience is completed in the last rooms, more oriented to scientific knowledge. Here are some of the tools used by the Bioacoustic application laboratory in their investigations, such as buoys that collect animals of animals and with whichThey also serve to studyThe marine thaw. Information aboutThe history of bioacoustic, whose beginnings date backThe cold war With the first recordings underwater.
In these rooms it is also possible to listen to real recordings of bearded seals, humpback whales, dolphins and puppets. Everything to ask again: how is it possible that the moment of history that we have the most knowledge about the importance of sound in the sea coincideswith the one with the greatest noise contamination caused by the human being?What responsibility do we have with the ocean, great carbon sink,And with species that noise greatly affects? «Only through empathy and harmonic coexistence with the natural environment we can ensure a future Sustainable for coming generations, ”says Fundación Telefónica on its website on this sample. A full -ruling invitation to think and question, look and love See, but, above all, above all, to listen.