By Kathryn M. O'Neill

Constructed of maple, steel, and plastic tubing, the computer-controlled kinetic sculpture Whale largely fills one upstairs gallery at the MIT Museum. As its 14 rotors spin, the 20-foot-long piece emits an eerie song intended to last for 225 years—roughly the lifespan of a bowhead whale.

“The thing that I really wanted was for people to simply be drawn into this other sense of time and for it to be rewarding, for it to feel good, for it to feel beautiful, even if you don’t know why. So that’s the hope,” says Whale’s creator, Brooklyn, New York–based artist and engineer Andy Cavatorta SM ’10. “I think it’s my first piece that 100 percent feels the way I wanted it to feel, and it’s because it feels like it has this life inside of it.”

Cavatorta, who has exhibited work at such landmarks as New York’s Museum of Modern Art and London’s Royal Opera House, got his big break while pursuing his master’s degree at the MIT Media Lab. Icelandic singer-songwriter Björk came by the lab to see what the students were working on; she liked his work and ended up commissioning Cavatorta to create sound sculptures for her.