The Missing Dark Matter

Dark matter is the name given to an invisible form of matter inferred from its gravitational effects. It is thought to play a central role in the formation and dynamics of most galaxies, helping to prevent their stars from flying apart. Although we do not yet know what dark matter is made of, its gravitational influence is considered fundamental to the cosmic structure and, by extension, to our own existence and the world as we know it.

A few years ago, astronomers challenged this assumption by identifying galaxies that appear to contain unexpectedly little dark matter. The finding reveals as much about us as about the cosmos. When our models fail to match experience, we tend to invent explanations and then search for evidence to support them.

In The Missing Dark Matter, dark matter speaks with a mystical voice. Its presence or absence shapes the character of the sound space and the order or disorder of its materials. Move among the portals that inject new sonic matter into the courtyard of the Volkskundemuseum am Paulustor, and decide whether you prefer to linger in a zone where the gravitational scaffold of dark matter holds the structure in check, or in one without.

Many of the sounds are created by sonifying simplified, scientifically informed models of galaxies. Each star is mapped to a sound source and spatialised according to its position relative to the system’s barycentre, sometimes with dark matter holding the structure together, elsewhere without it.