The Frequency Of Trees

Abstract

The Frequency Of Trees is part of the Yorkshire Sculpture Park (YSP) Open Air collection and has an extremely large footfall (700,000 visitors during 2015/16). Public audiences engage with the research directly when walking through the grounds of the park. Spectators discuss how sound moves and how the body responds. The sculpture comprises of a series of 12 tuning forks tuned to the frequency of different trees within YSP: Oak, Horse Chestnut, Beech and the Cedar of Lebanon in the Formal Garden. The frequency of sound is measured by counting the number of occurrences of an event per unit of time. By measuring the number of times a branch or leaf on a tree moved a certain distance within a set time frame, Locke was able to equate tree movements with Hertz readings, the unit used to measure sound. After striking the tuning forks, spectators are required to listen for the resonating frequencies that continue long after the initial strike – these are the pure musical tones that exist after the initial high overtones recede. The commonly stated human hearing range is 20–16000Hz thus the 16Hz fork appears to have no sound, however , spectators can still enjoy the sight of sound by watching the fork resonate. The work is used as generator for learning on various educational programmes at Yorkshire Sculpture Park .