Inspiration can come like a bolt out of the blue, a flashing epiphany, a crash of thunder or as gently as the soft sound of trickling water.

It was that sound of water trickling into a trough that gave Andy Wyeth the inspiration to paint “Spring Fed,” one of his famous paintings of the Kuerner Farm,

according to the Brandywine River Museum’s Mary Cronin.

For a short time — until May 24 — museum visitors who take the guided tour of the farm can get an aural feel for those sounds from “Kuerner Sounds,” a special artistic presentation created by Philadelphia-based sound engineer and musician Michael Kiley, who usually composes for dance and theater.

Kiley said he had heard of Wyeth, but didn’t know anything about him before the project started.

“I didn’t know his history or his relationship with this place,” Kiley said during a press tour of the farm that included listening to his work. He credited Cronin for giving him a crash course in Wyeth 101.

After taking a tour of the farm in March, Kiley spent another hour listening to and recording its natural sounds. He manipulated those sounds, then wrote a melody and blended the elements to come up with a five-minute audio presentation for people taking the tour. The museum calls it a “pop up” because it’s a short listen and will go away in less than a week.

The sounds are on an iPod Shuffle and people listen through headphones before or after the tour.

“I’m very interested in how sound can affect people’s perception of place,” Kiley said. “That’s a large part of the work I’m trying to do on my own and how I can bring design work and composition out into the public atmosphere, instead of just existing in the theater,” Kiley said.

Museum Executive Director Tom Padon said the pop up is the first experiment in “recasting the visitor experience,” and making it “a personal experience.” He added that bringing in Kiley represents “new thinking” for the museum.

The ideas is also a way to get visitors to think differently about the, the farm and get a sense of what Wyeth experienced during his thousands of trips to Kuerner homestead.

Kiley was chosen because he had done a similar piece for Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia. Money from the project came from a Pew Center for Arts and Heritage grant. It’s part of a Pew project called No Idea is too Ridiculous.  One of the conditions of the grant was that the project had to be finished within eight weeks, from idea to finish, Cronin said.

It is experimental and Cronin is interested in seeing how the public receives the experience.

“We have people coming here for a traditional one-hour tour of an historic property. We’re introducing an element that’s a little different for most people. We’re asking them to put on headphones and wander around a little and think about sound,” she said. “Part of the challenge is to see how this integrates into a tour…We’re going to be monitoring reactions. How does it work when you come to see the Kuerner Farm?”

Featured photo: Artist Michazel Kiley explains his pop up, "Kuerner Sounds."