HOUSTON IS SINKING
HOUSTON IS SINKING
Steve Parker
Steve Parker
HOUSTON IS SINKING uses defunct navigational tools to sonify land loss in Houston, Texas—one of the fastest sinking cities on earth. The project materializes in two parts: as a gallery exhibition of interactive sonic sculptures made from antiquated nautical tools, and as a community performance in Galveston Bay featuring a massive foghorn choir.
The exhibition features an ecosystem of interactive sculptures that sonify accelerating land loss. As visitors enter the gallery, they encounter a constellation of alien contraptions that are suspended from above u2013 as if floating in water. Merging antiquated seafaring devices (astrolabes, sextants, telegraphs) and new sensory technologies (motors, sensors, speakers), the sculptures respond to viewer touch and proximity to produce sound and movement
The audio played by the sculptures is derived from three Gulf Coast sources: recordings of low-frequency subsurface vibrations, geographic survey data, and geological maps interpreted as musical notation. Viewers activate the sculptures to trigger this audio content in real time. Fundamentally, the sculptures are an ensemble that makes the imperceptible heard: they translate subterranean activity into a kinetic musical composition.
The exhibition is augmented with screenings, workshops, panels, and new compositions by local youth. Concurrent with the exhibition, a 100+ member foghorn choir, comprising community members and area boaters, performs a cacophonous, 30-minute musical score. Situated on shore and sea in Galveston Bay, the piece uses intuitive notation so that anyone, regardless of musical skill, can perform in the concert. The work functions like a massive, participatory warning signal.
Public Art, Sculpture, Sound Art, Visual Arts
2025
About Steve Parker
Austin, TX
Steve Parker is an artist, musician, and organizer based in Austin, Texas. He is the recipient of the Rome Prize, the Pollock-Krasner Award, and grants from the National Endowment for the Arts. He is currently a McKnight Visiting Composer with the American Composers Forum.
Parker makes social sculptures: large-scale performances that facilitate meaningful interactions between the public, densely-layered sculptural objects, and the environment. His projects include an outdoor opera for 1.5 million bats, megaphone choir, and echolocation devices; monumental ear trumpets inspired by obsolete WWII surveillance tools; and cathartic transportation symphonies for pedicabs, automobiles, and bicycles. His work often situates the viewer as a performer, engaging them in new forms of listening.
Exhibition and performance highlights include the American Academy in Rome (Italy), Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art (Arkansas), CUE Art Foundation (New York), the Fusebox Festival (Texas), Gwangju Media Art Festival (Korea), the Lincoln Center Festival, Los Angeles Philharmonic inSIGHT, the Lucerne Festival (Switzerland), MASS MoCA (Massachusetts), Rich Mix (London), and SXSW.
As a solo trombonist and as an artist of NYC-based “new music dream team” Ensemble Signal, he has premiered 200+ new works. In 2025, he will work as a Fulbright Scholar at National Taiwan University.
Steve Parker is an artist, musician, and organizer based in Austin, Texas. He is the recipient of the Rome Prize, the Pollock-Krasner Award, and grants from the National Endowment for the Arts. He is currently a McKnight Visiting Composer with the American Composers Forum. Parker makes social sculptures: large-scale performances that facilitate meaningful interactions between the public, densely-layered sculptural objects, and the environment. His projects include an outdoor opera for 1.5 million bats, megaphone choir, and echolocation devices; monumental ear trumpets inspired by obsolete WWII surveillance tools; and cathartic transportation symphonies for pedicabs, automobiles, and bicycles. His work often situates the viewer as a performer, engaging them in new forms of listening. Exhibition and performance highlights include the American Academy in Rome (Italy), Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art (Arkansas), CUE Art Foundation (New York), the Fusebox Festival (Texas), Gwangju Media Art Festival (Korea), the Lincoln Center Festival, Los Angeles Philharmonic inSIGHT, the Lucerne Festival (Switzerland), MASS MoCA (Massachusetts), Rich Mix (London), and SXSW. As a solo trombonist and as an artist of NYC-based “new music dream team” Ensemble Signal, he has premiered 200+ new works. In 2025, he will work as a Fulbright Scholar at National Taiwan University.