Research Catalogue

A 2-part module by the MA Transdisciplinary Studies of ZHdK, Department Kulturanalysen und Vermittlung. Held by Anna Rubi & Eirini Sourgiadaki. Autumn 2023-Spring 2024 Colour perception varies, so do the semantics of colour terminology, for both sighted and blind individuals. The questions around colour perception from ophthalmology or neurobiology perspectives to cognitive and artistic ones, are infinite: Is there a universal human experience of the blue sky, the green grass and the brown soil? How is colour perceived in the brain, how is it translated into a communicable concept and how does it affect our perceived world, our mental and physical state? What is the role of colour in synesthesia? And most importantly, does colour have to do just with vision? In this module we work with the generation of blue colour on print, using the major light source available, the Sun. The Island of Amorgos is often referred to as “Le grand bleu” after the famous french film was shot at location. Its ancient name is “Melania”. “Melani”, the Greek word for ink, (“Melano” for dark blue, cyan) as it is said that in ancient times the place was covered with dark green flora. Our investigation begins exactly with this deep tint. We pay a visit to the famous monastery and the water oracle, walk the trails to observe the sensual -not only vision-based- shades of blue. In the spring term, we participate in local activities such as beach clean-up initiatives of the remote bays by local fishermen and their boats. We visit bee-hives and herb-distilleries, we work with the most basic bits and pieces of the island to capture its essence.

Thesis / Research Document of the Royal Academy of Art, The Hague, 2025 BA Interior Architecture and Furniture Design Summary (8968)

Through an artistic research process, I examine the ethical issues that arise in transcultural music composition, a context familiar to the students of the Global Music department at the Sibelius Academy of the University of the Arts Helsinki. Through reflexive autoethnography and musical analysis of the composition used for my Bachelor concert, I look at the questions of cultural appropriation vs. appreciation, and imitation vs. plagiarism. In the discussion I use a reflexive and investigative process for navigating these questions, and in the conclusion I expose my reflections and ideas on how to tackle this elusive yet important subject.

The impossibility of perfect translation is a widely acknowledged trope, yet translation remains a powerful act of meaning-making. This research-creation project investigates not what is lost, but what is gained through translation, by presenting and reflecting on our artistic re-interpretation of Dichterliebe, Robert Schumann’s nineteenth-century song cycle on texts by Heinrich Heine. Drawing on theories of translation by Walter Benjamin, Umberto Eco, and Hans Vermeer, we approach art song translation beyond its conventional linguistic scope, exploring it as a mode of modernization and gendered recontextualization. Our project, The Poet’s Love(r), features a new, singable English translation, alongside newly composed spoken poetry that gives voice to the song cycle’s historically silent female protagonist. In our methodological approach, we consider translation as a generative act within a broader artistic assemblage, incorporating artificial intelligence (AI)-generated images derived from the translated texts. These visuals, created with minimal textual prompts, offer a ‘post-human’ reflection on our hybrid nineteenth-century/twenty-first-century intervention, illuminating both the creative potential and the inherent biases of AI-generated art. Through an iterative process of artistic experimentation, pedagogical engagement with students at the mdw — University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna — and comparative analysis of contemporary Dichterliebe adaptations, we examine the strengths, limitations, and ethical considerations of translation as artistic research. Ultimately, we argue that translation — understood both linguistically and as creative transformation — can enhance access to art song’s multiple communicative layers (music, text, subtext), expanding its interpretative possibilities. By embracing a translational methodology, we advocate for a shift away from rigid notions of fidelity to historical works and toward a more dynamic, pluralistic engagement with musical tradition, informed by feminist, posthumanist, and experimental artistic perspectives. By situating The Poet’s Love(r) within a broader assemblage of interpretations — drawing on Paulo de Assis’s concept of musical works as decentralized, evolving entities — the project challenges traditional notions of fidelity and authorship in art song. It argues for translation as a vital creative practice that expands accessibility, deepens emotional resonance, and enriches the afterlife of canonical works. Download Accessible PDF

In a hyper-individualised, market-driven neoliberal world where everyone is considered responsible for their own success and happiness, the notion of a common or collectively lived future seems either naive or — given the Eastern and Central European experiences of failed state socialism — totalitarian. To this, the natural and social sciences offer a counter-hypothesis: We already are interconnected in terms of biological matter, ecosystemic relations, climate systems, shared societal infrastructure, and even global financial markets. Socialised as individuals, though, we lack the tools to refer, relate, and act towards this reality. Monika, besides being an organically formed name for the artistic collective of me and my two artist colleagues (Matyáš Grimmich and Karolína Schön), is a lens and shared body through which I offer entry to this framework. This exposition follows an ongoing performative research project on models of relating — becoming ‘we’ on the planetary, social, and political scale. The research centres on concepts of the expanded self and politics of unity, focusing on testing existing models or developing new methods of becoming more-than-just-self. Its participatory installations, video works, workshops, and research performances were tested and presented in residency and gallery spaces. These outcomes are organised around three strategies — object and its use; situation and its record; story and its act of telling. Methodically, the exposition (and henceforth the whole research) uses poetic and prosaic language to address people as individual selves and poetically suggest what if we perform the multividual, rather than uphold the individual. This approach hopes to build affective relation towards the reality of a shared planet (Latour 2018), where all entities are connected and interdependent, with agency emerging from in-between, not from a particular ‘one’. Download Accessible PDF

The artistic works discussed in this article – two audio pieces and three experimental films – showcase a tangible connection with the tools, machines, and processes used in their making. The sonic works include Mes bronches by Henri Chopin and “Opus Putesco” by Jacob Kirkegaard. The films feature Noisy Licking, Dribbling & Spitting by Vicky Smith, Transit(ive) by Sarah Bliss, and a Darkness Swallowed by Betzy Bromberg, including a soundtrack by Pam Aronoff. The five case studies depict the technologically mediated human body as the source and basis of sound. This article aims to examine the complex relationship between materiality and hapticity. The theoretical approach will explore how performativity is embedded in the production of embodied sounds (and images) and why a dynamic view of materiality is essential. It will then discuss haptic vision and haptic listening, shifting the focus to the act of reception. As I will argue, engaging with the material through embodied forms of art production and reception has significant ethical and political implications.