KAIROS

MFA Abstract: KAIROS: A Fulcrum for Composing Audio Drama

Audio drama, a contemporary term for storytelling through sound whose roots lie in the traditions of radio drama, has long been touted as a “theater of the mind” or “a movie in the mind” as the imagination must render the visual imagery. The reinscribing of audio drama as a visual medium, based on its lack of one in the technological sense, joins efforts to repackage the audio drama form to elicit interest from a wider audience, yielding such terms as the “audio movie” or the “podcast movie”. However, the defining characteristic of a movie or film is the presence of the spatial frame that constructs space through which elements move and meaning is created, not only through arrangement in time but space. My practice explores codes of spatial representation that could lend greater authenticity for this comparison to film.

My project, titled Only Afterland, utilizes a classical linear narrative to maximize accessibility to a wide audience to complement the spirit of this thesis. It posits a foundational model for my method. Focused on post-production process and anchored by stereophonic positioning, my practice aspires to simulate a filmic environment by artificially constructing space within a stereo-image and creating artistic meaning between the sound elements based on their spatiality, as film does with visual elements.

I call my method for audio drama: KAIROS. This stands for: Kinematic Audio through the Intermedial Representation Of Space. This intermedial construction of visual space, through which elements move and interact to create virtual movement-images, explores a deeper potential to compose complex filmic worlds using only sound.