Disoriented Flight: Avian Life in the Technological City

This project explores birds not merely as ecological indicators, but as sensory subjects embedded within technologically mediated urban environments. 

Contemporary cities function as infrastructures of perception shaped by glass, artificial light, chemical exposure, and continuous noise. These conditions actively reorganize how birds orient, communicate, and survive. 

Avian disorientation in modern cities is systemic rather than accidental. Artificial lighting disrupts circadian rhythms and migration; glass façades create fatal illusions of transparency; and urban noise masks essential acoustic signals. Environmental toxicity further complicates survival, introducing invisible threats into seemingly natural habitats.

The installation employs a multi-point spatial sound system to construct a distributed listening experience. Different sound channels present fragmented yet interconnected auditory perspectives, evoking disorientation, interference, and ecological stress. As audiences move through the space, they encounter shifting sonic conditions that resist coherence while forming an unstable whole.

Drawing on Science and Technology Studies (STS) and sound studies, the project reframes urban disturbance not simply as pollution, but as a form of mediation that redistributes the conditions of life. It invites audiences to reconsider how perception shapes responsibility toward  more-than-human worlds.