Telemegaphone Dale was inaugurated by the serene sounds of Bora Yoon.

Legs still sore after the amazingly exhausting mounting expedition and subsequent daily mountaintop debugging sessions we were happy to finally slip into our finest suits, cut that ribbon and officially reveal the Telemegaphone Dale’s phone number.

A small crowd of Dale inhabitants had gathered in the garden of the Nordic Artists’ Centre, located on top of Dalsåsen hill between the village down by the fjord and the Bergskletten peak looming to the southwest. The Telemegaphone were visually present as a tiny sihouette in the distance and magnified in a telescope.

Bora Yoon tele-performance

After a poignant opening speech by nkd-director Elísabet Gunnarsdottír the Telemegaphone Dale received a call by Brooklyn-based musician and sound artist Bora Yoon who performed a 5-minute Telemegaphone Concerto, prepared for the occasion. As Bora’s beautiful voice softly filled the valley people stood quiet, watery-eyed and listened. It’s was really quite touching.

A woman said the sounds reminded her kuling (old-style cow calling) and Norwegian traditional singing.

Åsa Ståhl recorded Bora Yoon’s performance onsite at Dalsåsen, 3 kilometers from the Telemegaphone. Crank up your volume, download it, or listen here:

Dale got the number first

We handed out the phone number, written on small business cards, to the people from Dale - half an hour before the rest of the world would have access to it.

People eagerly forwared the number to friends and relatives, and shortly afterward a deep, male voice sang a slow, sad tune. Everyone looked at each other to see who was the caller. Everyone shrugged. The Telemegaphone was no longer in our control.

Half an hour later we clicked the upload button, published the phone number online, and waited for the world to enter.

Telemegaphone Dale is now in place on top of Bergskletten mountain. It was a tremendous collective carrying effort.

Special hats off for the team of horn-carriers who volunteered to help us carry a ton of stuff up the steep mountain in the blazing sun: Les Joynes, Bjørn Kowalski Hansen, Svein Ove Løseth, Maria Petschatnikov, Natalia Petschatnikov, Helga Steppan, Åsa Ståhl (who also shot the quad-action film above), and photographer David Zadig, we owe you big time and will remember this collective effort for ever!

Svein Ove is our new hero. Here’s a video of him climbing a 7-metres ladder, on the top of the Bergskletten fjell, mounting a 15 kg wind generator with one hand.

Sweaty gallery

These images speak for themselves:

A short version of The Making of Telemegaphone Dale.

The story of the Telemegaphone started already in the summer of 2007. I (Erik) was residing at the Nordic Artists’ Center in Dale, working on Pophorns and developing ideas for a new square in Dale. Unsworn was at the time discussing a series of concepts for poetic and unexpected phone services, then called Parafunctional Payphones, of with the Telemegaphone was the most interesting one. The village of Dale with its paradoxical mix of welcoming stunning scenery and geographically isolated location, yet internationally connected and with a welcoming atmospere, seemed like the perfect location to install the first Telemegaphone.

Tele-responsibility

We were also curious as to how our ideals of open, non-anxious action spaces - explored in projects such as the Four Ophones - would fare when. Does this kind of shared responsibility work also at a distance? Do you care about the people you have never met in a village you have never been to?

Bourgeois looks

The physical design of the Telemegaphone progressed from the typical alert-horns of warning and war towards a tasteful blend of public service, art-deco communications and reliable bourgeoisie. The Telemegaphone should look like a forgotten invention from the dawn of telephony, a confident product whose raison d’être is no longer questioned. The hexagonal, stainless steel horns with their decoratively curved support legs

Energy issues

There are no power outlets on top of Norwegian fjells so we had to come up with an alternative energy solution for this Telemegaphone. We disqualified solar power early on as this is one the rainiest regions in Europe. (Feel the rain in Pete Beste’s excellent Black Metal documentary shot in and around Dale.) A small 400W wind generator seemed like the perfect solution for a stormy mountaintop.

Pick up the phone

We’re extremely happy to have recruited Nicklas Marélius to join the team as Chief of Technical Wizardry. With a talent for getting-things-done Nicklas deviously managed to exposed the hidden serial port communications of modern Sony Ericsson USB-phones - a feat eagerly awaited by many. Now we can control the phone using a combination of the trusty Arduino microcontroller and a magic USB host chip. Nicklas even supplied the Telemegaphone with SMS remote control and reporting capabilities!

Off to Norway

Where we are now, we have already learned a lot. Cardboard is still king; Windmills are not toys (not even small ones); No two phones are the same. Now the hard parts begin: transporting the whole shebang up the mountain, and getting it to work. Still that’s nothing compared to the social and political issues connected to the Telemegaphone. Til topps!