Space, Sound and the Improvisatory

The past fifty odd years have seen the creation, growth and proliferation of both technologically mediated and more direct creative approaches to using urban and natural sounds in art, broadly construed. How do such practices, particularly those making use of the power of digital technologies, suggest ways of improvising with space and time? How does problematizing our normal interactions with space and sound suggest new configurations of social interactions, of political relations?

The conference Space Sound and the Improvisatory, from 19-21 October, both at the Onassis Stegi and out in the city focuses on the role of both urban and rural-based sound art and other performance practices (including music, dance and cross-art practices), with a focus on new digital technologies intended to use both sound and space in ways that enable users to improvise with and through our sonosphere and spatial environment. We also hope to address questions concerning the cultural specificity of the use of digital tools in this area — how do issues of race, gender, class, nationality, sexual identity and so on affect the ways these issues are conceived of, and the ways technologies are developed and employed? Among others, we will feature demonstrations of a number of soundwalk related apps developed around the world, and documentation and discussion of the Tuned City Project in Ancient Messene and the Soundscapes/Landscapes initiative of the Onassis Stegi and Medea Electronique.

The conference includes the exhibition Urban Sound Art / Sound Art in Public Spaces at the Onassis Stegi foyer +4, from 19th until the 28th October, where large sound installation projects created by sound artists in the city of Bonn since 2010 are displayed.

Credits

Curated by: Eric Lewis, Christos Carras
Parallel program curated by: Angeliki Poulou

Participants: Rani Al Rajji, Ludger Brummer, Nikos Bubaris, Rebecca Caines, Budhaditya Chattopadhyay, Teresa Connors, John Drever, hd.kepler platform, Thodoris Dimitrakos /Jannis Kozatsas / Kostas Passas (Krisi-Biannual Scientific Review), Olivier Le Gal & Rodolphe Alexis (Collectif MU), Jesus Jara Lopez & Patricia Dominguez Larrondo (Medialab-Prado), Úna Monaghan, Medea Electronique Art Collective, Gascia Ouzounian, Bill Psarras, George Samantas, Carsten Seiffarth, Carsten Stabenow, Ellen Waterman

In collaboration with: The International Institute for Critical Studies in Improvisation

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Supported by: E.Δ.Ω., Plato café

PROGRAM

EXHIBITION
Foyer +4

19-28 OCTOBER
“Urban Sound Art / Sound Art in Public Spaces”
Free Entrance | 10:00-22:00

Large sound installation projects created by sound artists in the city of Bonn since 2010 on exhibit at the Onassis Stegi foyer +4. An exhibition dedicated to sound art in urban public space.

Sound art in public spaces constitutes the center of bonn hoeren’s artistic work and research area. Initiated in 2010 by the Beethoven Foundation for Art and Culture of the City of Bonn, the curated project by Carsten Seiffarth (Berlin) has been studying continuously the acoustic conditions and sonic contexts which define modern urban spaces. For that bonn hoeren appoints yearly one artist to be that year’s city sound artist of Bonn. And with a residency the artist realizes a new sound installation for the city. In addition, the residencies include acoustic research and onsite investigations as well as scientific side events and education projects.

The exhibition “Urban Sound Art" documents the large sound installation projects created by Bonn city sound artists since 2010. Works by Sam Auinger (2010), Erwin Stache (2011), Andreas Oldörp (2012), Christina Kubisch (2013), Max Eastley (2014), Stefan Rummel (2014), Edwin van der Heide (2015), Gordon Monahan (2016) and Maia Urstad (2017) give an overview of how diverse the sound artists’ engagement with urban situations and spaces under bonn hoeren is. In their own unique ways, they all address subjects such as the interaction between sound and public space, sound and architecture, and sound and the natural environment, demonstrating the abundance of perspectives sound works "in situ" can offer.

“Urban Sound Art” is an exhibition of bonn hoeren, a project from the Beethoven Foundation for Art and Culture of the City of Bonn.

Artistic and Project Director: Carsten Seiffarth
Exhibition texts: Markus Steffens
Translations English: Philip Jacobs
Set-up in Athens: Carsten Stabenow
Design: graphic office cyan, berlin

MAIN PROGRAM
Upper Stage | All events will be held in English with no translation
Click here for keynote speakers' abstracts and bios.

FRIDAY 19 OCTOBER
18:15 | Introduction

18:30 | Film Screening: "Soundscapes Landscapes' Soundwalks – Rhizomes I,II,III"
A Documentary by Medea Electronique
Watch the trailer here.

19:00 | Talks
Christos Carras: "Mediated Participation"
Rani Al Rajji: "Phonic Heimat"
Gascia Ouzounian: "Unplanning the Acoustic City: Sound Art in Post-War Beirut"

SATURDAY 20 OCTOBER
10:00-12:00 | Talks
Carsten Seiffarth: "bonn hoeren" | Sound Installation Art in Bonn since 2010
Bill Psarras: "Metaphors for walking; “Tuning” space, senses and imagination"
Nikos Bubaris: "Audio Walks and Intermediality"
Teresa Connors: "Creative coding in an Ecological Performativity Practice"

12:30-14:00 | Talks
Angeliki Poulou: "Soundwalking and Archiving: Convergences and Tensions"
Budhaditya Chattopadhyay: "Mise-en-sonore: Improvising with Space in Sound Art"
Carsten Stabenow: "What’s New in the City?: Improvisation as Curatorial Practice"

21:00-22:00 | Lecture-performance
Úna Monaghan: "Spaces to Improvise in Irish Traditional Music"

22:15-22:30 | Performance
Teresa Connors & Ellen Waterman: "Aspects of Trees"

SUNDAY 21 OCTOBER
16:30-18:00 | Talks
Rebecca Caines: "Improvised Remembering: Noise into Signal — a site-specific project in Wuhan, China"
John Drever: "The Role of Improvisation in Auraldiverse Soundwalking"
Ellen Waterman: "Klang-Opus á la fin de crépescule: Improvising Place and Space in the Cape Spear Project"

18:15-19:15 | Talks
Ludger Brummer: "The influence of timbre on spatial perception"
George Samantas: "Site-specificity and the Cloud: improvising with the spatial, temporal, and digital perceptions of space"

19:30-20:00 | Round table / Wrap-up session

PARALLEL PROGRAM (soundwalks & talks)
“Rewriting the Text of the City”

All events will be held in English with no translation
Participation is free; soundwalks require a reservation via e-mail at the following address: infotickets@sgt.gr

SATURDAY 20 OCTOBER
16:00-17:00 | “Astrorythmes”: A performative soundwalk by hd.kepler
Meeting point: Plato café (at 15:45), 61 Tripoleos st., Akadimia Platonos (opposite Plato's Academy Park)

18:00-19:30 | Creative teams meeting
Plato Café | 61 Tripoleos st., Akadimia Platonos
Participants: Thodoris Dimitrakos / Jannis Kozatsas / Costas Passas (Krisi Scientific Review), hd. kepler art & research platform (Eleni Riga - Florent Frizet), Medea Electronique art collective (Manolis Manousakis - Tim Ward)

SUNDAY 21 OCTOBER
9:30-10:30 | “Debating Athens”: A philosophical soundwalk by Thodoris Dimitrakos / Jannis Kozatsas / Costas Passas (Krisi Scientific Review)
Meeting Point: Association of Greek Archaeologists (at 9:15), 134 Ermou st.

11:00-12:00 | “Soundscapes Landscapes / Rhizome II / Gazi/Kerameikos/Metaxourgeio”: A soundwalk by Medea Electronique
Meeting Point: E.Δ.Ω. Creative Workshops Space, 18 Profitou Daniil st., Kerameikos, Athens
Instructions for downloading the app. Click here.

12.00-13.30 | App designers round table
E.Δ.Ω. Creative Workshops Space, 18 Profitou Daniil st., Kerameikos, Athens
Participants: MU Collective (FR), MediaLab Prado (ES)
Moderated by: Gascia Ouzounian