Public Afterimage

In 1969, John Cage’s HPSCHD presented music as a living system: a world of sound, image, machines and chance, inviting audiences to immerse themselves fully. Decades later, bachelor’s and master’s students from the ArtScience department activate the Atrium as a place to experience the world anew.

On 4 March, twenty harpists perform Postcard from Heaven by John Cage on twenty harps. The music triggers a daylight projection that unfolds after the performance as a visual resonance. It merges with everyday life in the public space and continues to shape the experience of the space, even as it slowly fades from view.

The title Public Afterimage refers to this effect. Just as an image lingers on the retina after you look away, this intervention leaves an afterimage in the public space. Not only in what you see, but in how you look and listen.

Where HPSCHD is expansive and overwhelming through its abundance of simultaneous events, Postcard from Heavenoffers an invitation to experience space attentively. Like a message from afar, without a sender, that briefly appears and then remains.

In a world driven by control and prediction, Public Afterimage creates space for chance, stillness and perception.