Audience members for Jen Reimer's performances at the Humboldt Water Tower were encouraged to venture up the 80-foot-high structure. (Submitted Photo/Becky Zimmer)

By Becky Zimmer

Coming Alive

Montreal artist amplifies voice of the Humboldt water tower

Sep 2, 2023 | 1:05 PM

The Humboldt Water Tower has been part of the rural skyline for the last 108 years.

Residents and visitors got to hear its voice earlier this week thanks to a performance by Montreal-based artist Jen Reimer.

Reimer, who is originally from Alberta, has traveled around the world finding spaces to perform and record the natural sounds within the space.

The 80-foot water tower ended up being a perfect fit for her since it is like a giant metal tube with its own vibrations.

Reimer took eight recordings of the space and presented them through a digital program on her laptop to send the different resonances and harmonies back through speakers and transistors placed throughout the water tower.

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All in all, she was able to take the sounds that were already there and amplify them for people to experience.

“I did a lot of field recordings there. And then I experimented with amplifying the field recordings through these surface transducers that actually vibrated the whole structure.”

Audiences were small, intimate groups of 10 due to the structural limits of the tower with Reimer doing a total of 12 performances throughout the day. Reimer encouraged everyone to venture up and down the tower to see how the sound changed throughout the structure.

Reimer experienced it herself while she was making her recordings.

“At the bottom, I could feel a lot of the lower vibrations like the subsonic frequencies, and then as I went closer to the middle, you started to hear everything, and you could really hear the spaciousness as well. And then as you near the top, that sound kind of muted a little bit.”

Smaller audiences also meant more intimate discussion following the performance where Reimer heard from other people what they experienced during the performance.

Meanwhile, Jennifer Fitzpatrick, cultural services director with the Humboldt and District Museum and Gallery, was intrigued when Reimer first contacted her about using the space.

“I don’t think I fully understood the complexity of the resonances she was describing, but I knew the artists can activate spaces in unique ways,” she said. “I was thrilled to say yes to working with Jen.”

The 12 performances brought a total of 126 people into the space.

“We heard some folks say it was emotional to feel and experience the tower in that powerful way… those sounds are always moving through the tower, but Jen was able to make them audible and come alive,” added Fitzpatrick.

Reimer hopes to take the recordings and eventually turn them into a published soundtrack that everyone can experience. She would also like to see the recording continue in some way since she fell in love with the water tower and Humboldt.

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becky.zimmer@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @bex_zim