The hills are alive with the sound of printers

In this age of advanced technology, information super-highways and virtual reality, two Canadian artists appear to have taken the whole process one step too far.

From 5-7 October, the Institute of Contemporary Arts is hosting Symphony 2 for Dot Matrix Printers, a concert devised by Thomas McIntosh and Emmanuel Madan using obsolete office technology to ‘fascinating effect’.

An ‘orchestra’ of 12 dot matrix printers is ‘conducted’ by a network server through 12 PCs. The server then sends out commands to the PCs causing the printers to print fragments of text files with the sounds broadcast over a PA.

According to publicity material for the event, the result is ‘amazing rhythmically driven music close in spirit to techno’.

A relaxing and highly interesting evening to be had by all then!