Opus Pericardium is Sarah Harvey's first major exhibition working in collaboration with composers, Simon C Russell and Tim Yates; and scientists Professor Macfarlane at the University of Glasgow Dept. of Medical Cardiology, and Richard Whale, Senior Lecturer at Brighton and Sussex Medical School.

This is a research and development project that explores the notion of the heart as something personal, yet also collective.

Using anonymised digital data of electrocardiogram (ECG) readings, which have been generously supplied from Glasgow University's Academic database and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Opus Pericardium transposes this ECG data through digital software to create audio soundscapes of the human heart.

Mapping the ECG results could produce complex sound material; the team will explore the physical qualities that will determine the acoustics of the heart readings. The collaboration will be a human interpretation. It’s envisaged that this will allow one of the fundamental questions to be explored, what the nature of ECG heart data is, and how we as a group experience and interpret its resonation.

Opus Pericardium is a culmination of work that Sarah Harvey has been undertaking for the past three years, and builds upon a previously successful project Chambers, which focused upon taking the heartbeat of live musicians and creating a live score with the musicians playing their own heartbeats, using paper-plotted ECG heart scores.

The resulting sound installation was exhibited for a month at SoundFjord who offered a designated gallery space in the summer of 2012.

Visit the news and events page for information on current activity on this project.