Kirsten Angerbauer creates immersive, multi-sensory experiences and installations constructed of site-specific designs, sound art practices, and new media.
Albuquerque | kirstenangerbauer.com | @k.angerbauer
Based in Albuquerque, Kirsten Angerbauer is a queer interdisciplinary artist. Their work combines elements of sculpture, video, and digital fabrication processes. Angerbauer creates large-scale, immersive, multi-sensory experiences and installations constructed of steel structures, site-specific designs, sound art practices, and new media.
One recent sculptural and sound installation from 2022—pink noise, 23hz—embodies the various aspects of Angerbauer’s aesthetic practice. The piece consists of dozens of pink flag tape strips that are anchored to and descend from the ceiling. Their lower ends are attached to a cross-hatched, plywood structure. The plywood structure sits atop several speakers. Sound waves emanating from the speakers send vibrations up the pink flag tape, generating rapid movement and a repetitive ambient noise. To this extent, pink noise, 23hz is a kinetic sculpture, a sound installation, and a work of abstract art that explores concepts of identity, queerness, and our relationship to the environment.
Angerbauer says that “sound has the power to bridge the gap between our innermost selves and the external world. This concept drives my artistic research into queer expression.” By creating abstract, sculptural artworks that produce non-normative sounds, they have the ability to “disrupt and re-contextualize traditional systems of power and representation.” Moreover, the artist’s sound-based works test “physics of sound and its relationship to the often-unnoticed background noise of our daily lives.”
Angerbauer has shown work in both solo and group exhibitions across the country, including Currents New Media Festival 2022 in Santa Fe, True/False Film Festival 2020 in Columbia, Missouri, and TIME (Temporary Installations Made for the Environment) 2019 in Los Alamos, New Mexico. Kirsten works as director of the fabrication lab at the University of New Mexico School of Architecture and Planning. They hold a BFA in sculpture from University of North Texas and are currently pursuing an MBA at UNM.
