Radical Atmospheres

Radical Atmospheres is an audio AR app that brings the history of East Harlem's radical activism out of the archive and onto the street. The app enables listeners to walk in the footsteps of radical Puerto Rican activists and hear the hidden history of liberation movements in El Barrio in the locations where it happened.

The project maps the desires for alternative futures of liberation movements and communities seeking social justice against a backdrop of systematic federal and local government suppression in East Harlem.It is a co-created project made in the Integrated Media Arts MFA program at Hunter College that uses materials from the Center for Puerto Rican Studies archive to create a tapestry of sound poetry and community oral histories from the past and present.

**Listening to Radical Atmospheres from a desktop/laptop:**

Click the link above
Click ‘listen’
Zoom in all the way
Press the play button once at the bottom of the screen.
When your icon radius envelopes a map pin, you will hear the corresponding audio clip.
Please use Google Chrome or Firefox browsers.

Audio Augmented Reality, AAR, CENTRO, Radical Atmospheres

Featuring Oral History Interviews with members of the Young Lords, the MPI/Puerto Rican Socialist Party, El Comité, the East Harlem Renegades and community members who grew up in East Harlem during the 1960’s and 70’s.

Interviewees: Gil Cintron, Máximo Rafael Colón, Olga Iris Sanabria Dávila, Frank Diaz, Ray Delgado, Rolando Gonzalez, Lillian Jiménez, Iris Morales, Denise Oliver, Raymond Perez, Carmen Vivian Rivera, Walter Bosque Rosa, Arnie Segarra, Minerva Solla & Andrés Torres

Student Contributors:

Nina Bowers, Emma Rose Brown, Samantha Carter, Mary Gruesser, Anisa Hodsic, Kassandra Luyando, Phillip Desmond, Andrey Patino, Susanna Randolph & Leo Sano

Created in Prof. Andrew Demirjian’s Spaces Speak class in the Integrated Media Arts MFA at Hunter College

Oral histories recorded and edited by Emma Rose Brown, Mary Gruesser, & Andrew Demirjian

Audio Locations

There are over 120 audio clips organized in groups around East Harlem.

The audio is often related to the location of the subject so the listener hears stories or sound collage works that relate to the history of where they are standing.

Other audio clips provide context about the different movements to help listeners understand the social, cultural, economic and material conditions of East Harlem.

For many of the pin locations, there are multiple audio clips at the site.

Audio Locations Detail

This detail map of one block provides an example of the variety of approaches to the audio material a listener hears in the app.

Some of the clips use experimental sound collage and conceptual poetry techniques using archival materials while other areas feature excerpts of oral histories of different activists.

Special thank you to Debbie Quiñones, Johanna Fernandez, Cristina Fontánez Rodríguez, Mickey Melendez, Lenin Nadal, Iris Morales, Angel Antonio Ruiz Laboy, Karina Ordóñez, Kimberly Roa, Marc Cuadra. and Rosa Cruz Cordero.

Contact