Hyperterrestrial

SPATIAL SOUND INSTALLATION AT V&A EAST FOR CMMR-25

Hyperterrestrial drifts through soundscapes that, while seemingly faithful, reveal themselves as layered, hyper-real interpretations of place; versions that evoke how we might imagine, desire, or misremember them to sound.

Constructed from field recordings gathered across four trips to three sites — Dungeness Nuclear Power Station, the Denge Sound Mirrors, and Romney Sands Holiday Park — the work focuses on one of England’s most paradoxical landscapes: the Dungeness Nature Reserve, at once overlooked and fetishised.

The piece explores how imagination, nostalgia, and fetishisation shape our perceptions of place, it's subtlety mischievously challenging the assumption that field recordings are objective documents rather than deeply subjective expressions.

Originally composed as a stereo work, Hyperterrestrial was presented across Yamaha's spatial sound system at V&A East for the 2025 Computer Music Multidisciplinary Research Symposium.

Hyperterrestial is available to listen to now on the Sounding Future website now, and will form part of a wider release of Isobel's soundscape works in early 2026.