Exploring Electromagnetic Fields with Vijay Thillaimuthu
In a world increasingly saturated with electronics, it can be easy to forget that every device we carry and every system we rely on is constantly humming with invisible activity. These electromagnetic fields surge around us at light speed, quietly shaping our technological, economic and cultural landscapes. In Electromagnetic Fields Forever, a full-day workshop led by R|Artist Residency: Urban Ecologies Artist-in-Residence Vijay Thillaimuthu, participants stepped directly into this unseen world, learning not just to detect it but to transform it into creative possibility.
Hosted in UniSC’s Maker Space, the first MIT-accredited Fab Lab in Queensland, the workshop unfolded as a rare blend of engineering, listening practice and artistic experimentation. With laser-cut components prepared onsite, attendees constructed their own electromagnetic microphones (based on a design by Slovakian instrument manufacturers, LOM), devices capable of capturing the stray signals that leak from the circuitry of our everyday objects.
For many participants, the workshop offered a first encounter with the raw sonics of electromagnetic waves. Once assembled, the microphones were put to immediate use, turning the Maker Space and adjoining Art Gallery into a testing ground. Phones, laptops, lighting systems, vending machines: everything suddenly became a potential sound source. What is silent to our ears revealed itself as dense textures, rhythmic pulses, clicking patterns and ghostly tonalities.
These unintentional broadcasts formed the beginnings of a library of electromagnetic field recordings, a shared repository of sounds that will contribute to Vijay’s ongoing audiovisual research that forms part of his residency. Throughout the day he demonstrated how such recordings translate into creative outcomes, showing excerpts of past works, including laser-driven performances where light modulates sound in real time, experimental compositions and a work presented at the Goa Festival. Participants were invited not only to listen but to imagine how these frequencies might be shaped into their own artistic languages.
While the workshop was grounded in hands-on fabrication, it continually returned to the question of what it means to listen beyond the limits of human perception. Vijay framed the practice of electromagnetic field recording as a way to tune in to the technological ecologies we inhabit. Sound became a diagnostic tool, a poetic instrument and a method of environmental awareness.
Visual artists in particular found new pathways into sound-based research, discovering how electromagnetic microphones could extend their existing practices into the auditory realm. Others used the space to experiment freely, chasing unusual signals and discussing the cultural, environmental and aesthetic implications of our wired world.
By the end of the workshop, each participant left with a functional, hand-built microphone along with the ability to capture sounds that we are immersed in without ever noticing. More than a technical exercise, Electromagnetic Fields Forever was an invitation to rethink the everyday tools and technologies that surround us, listen to the hidden energy that powers our daily lives, and consider how these frequencies can be source material for future creative work.
No prior experience was required, only curiosity. As the room filled with clicks, drones and shimmering static, it became clear that the invisible has plenty to say.
Photos by SCCA.
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R|Artist Residency: Urban Ecologies is presented by SCCA through The Refinery. Supported by Major Partners: Queensland Government through Arts Queensland, Sunshine Coast Council through the Regional Arts Development Fund, and the Creative Ecologies Research Cluster at UniSC, and Media Partners: In Publishing (Hello Sunshine Magazine and IN Noosa Magazine).
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