Commissioned by Liverpool City Region’s Civic Data Cooperative as part of the Festival of Data 2026.
Living Score is an interactive artwork offering a sonic representation of Liverpool’s public green spaces by translating environmental data into sound.
The project began with a hands-on workshop at the Festival of Data. Using local maps and Green Infrastructure Framework data from Natural England, schoolchildren from King’s Northway Primary created large-scale visual artworks.
To bring these physical pieces to life, the artist developed a custom software interface that reads specific colours in the artwork to generate looping audio patterns. The software essentially allows audiences to “hear” patterns in the data, triggering a soundscape composed of two distinct audio sources:
- Field recordings: Authentic sounds captured by the artist across various local parks.
- Vocal interpretations: Audio of the children responding to an immersive soundscape walk, recorded during the workshop.
The artwork was exhibited at the Civic Data Coop’s Festival of Data on 7th February 2026.
As the software reacts to colour, every individual artwork creates its own unique sonic signature. During the exhibition at the Festival of Data, visitors were invited to interact with the installation by swapping over the different artworks – much like changing vinyl LPs on a record player.
The project culminated in a final video piece, which features a continuous, evolving soundscape created by seamlessly transitioning through all of the physical artworks produced during the workshop.
