Land of Bent Grass

2025

The first sound I remember is wind — the constant breath that moves across South Uist, an island almost stripped of trees or shelter. Its flat expanse of peat and machair leaves little for the air to cling to, so it becomes a presence of its own: shaping how one hears, feels, and remembers place.

This work translates that elemental memory into sound. Using live wind-speed and tidal data from the Outer Hebrides, a modular patch generates evolving tones of filtered noise and shifting resonance — an electronic imitation of the island’s restless atmosphere. Over time, the sound drifts between calm and turbulence, its texture shaped by the same forces that define the landscape itself.

Land of Bent Grass reflects on how environments inscribe themselves in us through listening — how the wind, more than any human voice, can become the first language of memory.