The world inside a warehouse in downtown Los Angeles seemed to stop, and all I saw was a blur of colors, where pinkish red shades bleed in shades of yellow and purple. And I was surprised by what I felt: rested but not tired. It was a deep and soothing state, in which I was awake but unable to focus on a specific thought or concern.
Even if it is only a moment, the concerns, the loneliness and the task lists felt to pass. Everything I tend to dwell was present but also slightly out of reach. Although I visited a chromasonic installation in December, with 2025 stressful start – Our region has struck by a devastation forest fire Who moved tens of thousands – I was looking forward to returning.
The descriptions of immersive experiences in 2025 tend to look like mental health pensions. Many boast of an ability to surround participants in fear, repairing consciousness, mitigating anxiety or inspiring dopamine release.
The exhibition of the city center of Chromasonic in Los Angeles aims to help customers reach a soothing introspective state.
(Chrommasonic)
And it is therefore that I found myself lying on a concrete floor, a small pillow under my head and translucent vertical slabs that surround me – aluminum frames with a light and apart fabric designed to diffuse light. I have set foot in many light and sound installations over the years and I used to promise something that looks like a world of wonder. If all goes well, I will see An art of another worldmaybe get A chance to play.
And yet, to Chromasonic, I didn't want to leave – or move, really.
Chromasonic is an artistic installation recently opened in the city center. There is also a chromasonic space in Venice, which was launched in 2021 and is a more intimate solitary area. In the city center district, the exhibition – Chromasonic field is its official name – you are free to walk and can get involved in other groups, although extremely quietly.
I walk in and out of the square mini-spaces while slowly changing the ceiling LED lights make their limits slightly elusive. A ambient soundtrack inspired by Brian Engogue adorns the room, the audio in which the synthetic and the human mix until it is impossible to discern an instrument. The whole area is dedicated to the transitional.
“What is interesting about Chromasonic is that there is no cultural context to sound and a cultural context in light,” explains Susan Magsamen, co-author of “Your Brain on Art: How The Arts transforms us”. Magsamen is also a member of the faculty of the Neurology Department of Johns Hopkins University, where its academic objective is, in part, on the intersection of arts and mental health.
“You are dislocated,” says Magsamen about a chromasonic work. “It is not dissonant, but it is detached. You are in a suspended space which looks very like a uterus.
Creators of Chromasonic: Harriet Girardoni, standing on the left, and Orpheo McCord; Johannes Girardoni, left left, and Joel Shearer. The space aims to allow us to hear the light and see the sound.
(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)
Chromasonic is the creation of four artists. His thesis is somewhere between art and science. Interrogé sur son ambition émotionnelle, Johannes Girardoni, 57 ans, co-fondateur de l'artiste et chef de l'art de Chromasonic, parle du genre d'expériences transcendantes les plus associées, disons, de la nature ou des environnements communautaires soigneusement conçus – un musée d'art, peut-être, pour certains, pour certains, A themed park.
A chromasonic environment, known as Girardoni, is designed to be a fast way to a meditative state.
“It's almost like a hack,” says Girardoni. “Your brain and your senses are activated in a very different way because you do not find information – you do not find a normal story and normal reality. Deleting all this information – normal physical reality – allows us to move on to this new extended way of awareness of consciousness. I would say it is a very effective way to feel connected at this time. It is a very interior and thoughtful experience. ”
Regarding art, there are history. A collaboration with a colleague artist and installation partner Harriet Girardoni, as well as with artists / composers sound orpheo McCord and Joel Shearer, Chromasonic at first sight seems to be liable to the work of the artist born in Los Angeles James Turrell In that he uses light as one of his main materials. Johannes, based in Venice, is not afraid of this connection, paraphrasing a quotation of turret on art allowing us to “Feel detection. “”
“What we do, in particular, with Chromasonic,” says Johannes, “understands that we can increase mindfulness and mental health – just like a reduction in stress. It is art at the service of well-being. This is the main motivation for our work. ”
Chromasonic is an immersive art exhibition in Los Angeles.
(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)
In terms of achieving this objective, the chromasonic team worked on the means of transforming light into sound and vice versa. Johannes talks about the downtown space which finally hosted live music shows, the lighting of the room responding in real time to the musicians. They call for this “chromasonic” refnoitment process, and it is an attempt to synchronize light and sound waves, using technology to visualize these frequencies.
Conceptually, it is a belief that we can see the sound and hear the light. The software, says Johannes, allows the team to see how light and sound waves develop and contract. Interpreting them can be a more impressionist practice, but if everything works, says Johannes, a chromasonic space will have the impression of “living and breathing”.
“Red,” says Johannes, “is a long wave, and the violets are a short wave. You can map this to the sound. A long wave will generate weak sound, if you map it in real time. … When we compose, we must be careful. If you generate too many different sounds. ”
The Magsamen researcher thinks that the chromasonic team is on something.
“I think this idea of being radically present marries the other side of the medal of anxiety, depression and fatigue,” explains Magsamen. “They try to understand what noise is and what is the signal.”
The chromasonic field can look like a blur of light and sound, a limited space aimed at relaxation.
(Chrommasonic)
Once, by feeling particularly depressed, someone close to me prescribed rest. “Rest would be good,” she said, and of course, I went to bed. But I threw, turned and usually do something other than resting. I thought of her advice in lying at Chromasonic, because I think it is the kind of rest she meant, where concentration and concentration were free from discomfort to which they are often attached.
Because here, everything was slightly abstract – a sound buzz gave way to a misty mix of lights while I looked at various ideas and impressions. I have already felt a peace like that – a trip to Sequoia National Park comes to my mind – but what I liked in Chromasonic is that every sense of the place seemed distorted.
I knew, of course, I was in the city center. And yet, in this limited space dedicated to emotional drift, I really felt like I was nowhere.
