Representing noise: stacked plots and the contrasting diplomatic ambitions of radio astronomy and post-punk

Abstract

Sketched in 1979 by graphic designer Peter Saville, the record sleeve of Joy Division's Unknown Pleasures seemingly popularized one of the most celebrated radio-astronomical images: the ‘stacked plot’ of radio signals from a pulsar. However, the sleeve's designer did not have this promotion in mind. Instead, he deliberately muddled the message it originally conveyed in a typical post-punk act of artistic sabotage. In reconstructing the historical events associated with this subversive effort, this essay explores how, after its adoption as an imaging device utilized in radio astronomy, the stacked plot gave representation to the diplomacy agendas of two distinct groups. The post-punk reworking of the stacked plot exemplified the ambition of this artistic movement to attack the images associated with social conventions and norms by amplifying their ‘semantic noise’, and, in so doing, seeking to negotiate a social space for those sharing these subversive goals. Conversely, radio astronomers used the stacked plot to display the presence of interfering radio transmitters in the frequencies exclusively allocated to astronomical research, thus advocating the removal of this electronic noise in the context of international telecommunication negotiations. The article thus shows how the representation of different types of noise through similar images shaped contrasting ambitions in the separate domains of science diplomacy and everyday diplomacy.