Mono Wave Art Inception –
The wave art concept developed by myself, Alex Patterson, originated from a summer evening surf session. It was calm night with good surf conditions, offshore breeze, 4 ft glassy waves and the sun low in the sky. Exhausted from making it through the breaking waves I took a moment to recouperate on my board (8ft 6″ Red and black mini mal if you’re interested).

As I lay there, I closed my eyes and listened to the waves. I tried to imagine how the rhythm of the waves crashing onto the shoreline and the gentle swell of the water would look visually.
The contrast between the tranquility of the undulating swell and gentle breeze against the raw power and speed of the breaking waves.

After a few more waves I returned, exhausted to the car, dried myself off and collected my recording equipment. I made my way back to the shore to try and capture something of the essence of the waves.

Later that night as I listened again to the waves I decided to try and portray the soundwaves visually.

Development –
Using various sound analysis programs and art software I extracted the soundwaves from my recordings. Soundwaves are complex and multilayered. Generally they just look a bit too messy and to me did not capture the contrast of the calmness and wild power of the waves.
After trying various techniques I converted the sound wave into a singular or ‘mono’ wave. With a few more adjustments I had the beginnings of a beautiful wave form.

The mono wave form portrayed the gentle rise and fall of the wave sounds perfectly while encompassing natures unpredictable simplicity and chaos. Using a limited minimalistic colour pallette the sound wave almost looks like the white water of a wave as it is just starting to break.

Since creating this soundwave art I have been inspired to further explore the possibilities of sound as art. My website www.monowaveart.co.uk is currently under construction. When complete I will make wave art prints available for purchase as well as the facility to create your own personalised soundwave art commissions.