The green lawn beside the University Auditorium will house three 12-foot-tall whistles.
The Periplanómenos Whistles, a series of outdoor musical sculptures, are being installed on the east side of the auditorium. The Office of the Provost’s Creative Campus Committee paid about $20,000 for the sculptures through a grant, said Rotem Tamir, the artist and a visiting assistant professor of sculpture.
The sculptures are built out of virgin bald cypress — an extinct wood that can withstand Florida’s humidity. Tamir, an Israeli artist, will paint the wooden whistles to represent three extinct species of birds: the ivory-billed woodpecker, the passenger pigeon and the Carolina parakeet.
They went extinct around the same time as the virgin bald cypress swamps, she said. The whistles will each be carved out of a single trunk of the tree. To play each musical sculpture, students will step onto the base of the sculpture.
The sculptures are similar to oversized recorders, but without finger holes, she said. Two of them make a single pitch, while the third will play two pitches — one from the top half and the other from the bottom half.
Students can play the third instrument by moving their hand over a large hole in the side, she said.
Bryan Yeager, UF’s public arts coordinator, said he assisted Tamir in planning the installation of the sculptures. He worked with the UF’s Physical Plant Division and UF’s Environmental Health and Safety Division to ensure the artwork is safe and installed correctly.
The musical sculptures will be demonstrated April 20 at 5 p.m. by Kristen Stoner, a UF associate professor of flute, and the UF Flute Studio. Stoner said UF students will play short pieces that she composed specifically for the sculpture’s unveiling.
To create some of the pieces, Stoner said she drew upon nature and bird calls because of the sculpture’s bird theme.
She said she researched the bird calls of those species and the calls of other species that live in modern cypress swamps to incorporate into the pieces.
Stoner said she thinks the University Auditorium is a perfect location for the sculptures.
“It’s a very peaceful space, and the beautiful sculptural installation will fit very well there,” she said.
Tamir said she wanted to make playful sculptures. She started working on the installations about a year ago.
“Playing is valuable in order to deeply understand something,” she said.
