In 2016 I undertook a ‘quiet odyssey’ across four Australian cities (Adelaide, Perth, Sydney and Melbourne), documenting up to 500 quiet spaces in these built environments. I wanted to find new ways to articulate the need for immersive (and quiet) experiences in listening. This was a continuation of my 2012 project 'Stereopublic: Crowdsourcing the Quiet', an app that allowed the public to seek, record and map quiet city spaces. I wanted to encourage a way of being that embraced sonic health and wellbeing. I wanted to archive the sounds of these spaces as an act of quiet preservation. I believe that in the midst of all the noise we are losing our ability to hear and to listen and, as a result, we are walking off balance. We are shutting out the world by plugging in noise-cancelling headphones and putting unnecessary stress on our cochlear hair cells. The world is so loud. Surely this is the time to stop and enjoy the silence?

For this publication I invited a small selection of artists, writers, thinkers and designers to respond, each in their own way, to notions of listening, space, stillness and productivity, light and dark, noise and the sound of the future.