A Focus on the Senses

How many stimuli can our senses cope with at the same time? Technologies developed at the turn of the new millennium have vastly expanded the field of experimenting with our cognitive abilities. Artists performing during the Audio Art Festival (15-24 November) frequently reach for state-of-the-art technologies to combine visual arts with sound. The programme of the 27th festival includes concerts, performances and two installations: we explore Rafał Zapała’s work at Hevre, while Edwin van der Heide and Jan-Peter Sonntag present their art at Bunkier Sztuki. Concerts, all held at Hevre, open up worlds of turntablism (Ignaz Schick), acousmatic music (CIME/PSeME/SME project), heavily processed traditional folk (niewte collective) and electro-opera (Olga Szymula). The festival also features sounds created by computers (Laptop Ensemble and Richard Boulanger’s Cloning a Dinosaur), the internet of things (Seppo Gründler’s Earphone Concert), home-made instruments (Alex Nowitz’s strophonion) and artificial “creatures” which communicate with one another (Mateo Marangoni and Dieter Vandoren’s Lampyridae). More “traditional” contemporary music resounds at the Academy of Music (Martyna Zakrzewska Plays Peszat and Sonic Playground). Festival events will be streamed live. (Bartosz Suchecki, “Karnet”)