The Berlin based artist Nik Nowak deals critically with the use of sound as a cultural transmitter as is the case with music on the one hand, and with the abuse of sound as a weapon on the other. The short documentary directed by Hiroo Tanaka introduces Nik Nowak latest work “The Mantis,” a two-tonne monumental sound sculpture that, in a biomimetically hydraulic manoeuvre, rears up, preparing itself to do battle at a height of four meters. In January 2019 Nowak premiered his new sonic behemoth in a performative face-off against his earlier “Panzer” loudspeaker tank across a border fence, harkening back to the sonic wars that took place during the Cold War at the German/German border in the early 1960s.