Podcasts can take you to distant places with their stories, but you can also take those stories on your trip. With so -called soundwalks you get a kind of audio tour in a certain place. Artist Peter Veen made one in nature reserve De Onlanden.
“A lot of people are already going to the Onlanden and they just walk their daily round,” says Peter Veen. “This is a nice addition. What I hope is that people look at the same landscape in a different way.”
For the art project into Nature, he already did a kind of exploration of the area. About fifteen times roamed through waters, over bridges and through the greenery. He bundled what he encountered in a soundwalk called Stories.
Then you hear, for example, about how he tries to stroke a stubborn cow, which strikes him about the dod and what a birdwatcher tries to make clear to him.
It is a GPS-controlled walk, with a mini-podcast at ten locations. They can be listened to free via the Echoes.xyz app. When you walk somewhere in the Onlanden you suddenly hear a bell. Then your phone starts playing the podcast for that specific location.
“They are very short stories of 1 minute with sound and music. They ask to stand still for a moment and to listen and then you just continue again,” says Veen. The soundwalk can also be done by bike. The route is part of Inhale/Exhale, a project of Into Nature, Art & Culture and Kuunst.nu.
Veen previously made soundwalks in other areas, such as the Asserbos in Assen, the Rensenpark in Emmen and the Bargerveen. “I think it’s a very nice form of art. I always write texts. And if you put a text in a book, never sees anyone. So I prefer them to book outside. A soundwalk is a step more accessible than a book.”