Research Catalogue

'Empowering Collective Performing Arts: A Facilitator’s Toolkit for Overcoming Language Barriers' is a practice-led research project that explores the ways to encourage group connection through non-textual, embodied communication within diverse communities. Drawing on work experience with immigrant children, refugees, and deaf/hearing collaborators—as well as recent research residencies with ASSITEJ Norway, The Flying Seagulls and Red Nose Emergency Smiles—the project contains a growing body of facilitation strategies as an open-source toolkit. Rooted in my personal experience of linguistic displacement and background in voice and dance, this project proposes a shift away from text-centric facilitation models toward approaches that prioritise emotional intuition and situational awareness. The project is underpinned by critical frameworks around embodied knowledge, power, and positionality, aiming to challenge colonial and exclusionary norms around communication. Ultimately, it seeks to empower facilitators and communities alike to trust in the expressive potential of the body and encourage inclusive, trust-based spaces for collective performing arts experiences.

SWEAT - YoNoSudoBrillo Two weeks workshop held in Benidorm, Spain, in August 2024. In the context of EASA, European Architecture Students Assembly 2024 event. Tutored by Diana Ferro and Angelo Ciccaglione. 𝐼𝓉’𝓈 𝒶𝓁𝓁 𝒶𝒷𝑜𝓊𝓉 𝑒𝓂𝒷𝓇𝒶𝒸𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝓇𝑒𝓁𝒶𝓍𝒶𝓉𝒾𝑜𝓃. 𝐿𝑒𝓉'𝓈 𝑒𝓂𝒷𝒶𝓇𝓀 𝑜𝓃 𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓈 𝒿𝑜𝓊𝓇𝓃𝑒𝓎 𝑜𝒻 𝓌𝑒𝓁𝓁𝓃𝑒𝓈𝓈 𝓉𝑜𝑔𝑒𝓉𝒽𝑒𝓇. In a sauna, people meet strangers and exchange stories while absorbing heat being naked and sweaty. In this workshop we brought the sauna to a step further: we absorbed heat, stories, gestures, words, objects, skills, dreams and sweat them out to other people, re-enacting what we have learned. Also naked, why not. We learnt how to live, how to breathe, how to make a kebab, how to embody old wisdom, how to tie shoes the proper way. All you need is a fan, a towel and a body. A kebab stick, a drink, some snackies. Participants developed a deeper perspective on what it means to operate within a complex identity such as the city and gained skills to open their own kebab shop.

This exposition emerged from my participation in the second interval of the Simultaneous Arrivals (Simularr) Artistic Research Project—a research project inviting international artist-researchers to explore relational, situated, and process-based inquiries in dialogue with core researchers. Core researchers: Nayari Castillo, Hanns Holger Rutz, Franziska Hederer, and Daniele Pozzi. For the second interval, the visual artist and researcher Elena Radaelli and I were invited as visiting artist-researchers. (More information on Simultaneous Arrivals: https://simularr.net/about/) The exposition presents my process during the residency, i.e. my Traces and Paths Towards a Singularly-Plural Companionships. The eight-week residency (3 March-30 April 2024) took place across three sites: Graz (Austria); Lecce, San Cesario (Italy); and Klagenfurt (Austria). The exposition traces this journey through various mediums, including texts, graphics, video and audio material experiments, field encounters, and theoretical companions. My processes, are informed and shaped by my companion collaborators—human (research-creation companions), more-than-human, textual, and material—who co-inform and co-create the unfolding of the research.

This essay examines drawing as a consciously guided practice for fostering creative problem‐solving and idea generation. At its center lies the Sketch&Draw method, with its core principle of the “fluttering line.” Drawing on Stephen R. Covey’s (1989) concept of the space between stimulus and response, Mihály Csikszentmihályi’s (1990) flow theory, and Maurice Merleau‐Ponty’s (1945) notion of embodiment, it develops—via the Sketch&Draw method—the central principle of the “fluttering line.” Through workshop analyses and practice sketches from sketchanddraw.com, it is evident how the visual noise of the fluttering line opens a mental space in which spontaneous impulses and effortless presence both set the creative process in motion and give it structure. Participant reports illustrate how these uncontrolled networks of strokes are later experienced as “whispered impulses” that support the flow state. Finally, the essay discusses potentials, fields of application, and methodological limits in artistic, technical, and academic contexts, and outlines proposals for further empirical and interdisciplinary research.

This research explores the influence of bel canto, a distinguished Italian vocal style, on 19th-century guitar compositions, with a particular focus on the works of Luigi Legnani. Through detailed analysis, the study identifies key bel canto characteristics, such as expressive phrasing, melodic ornamentation, and dynamic contrasts, as integral elements in Legnani's guitar music. These findings highlight Legnani's skill in adapting the vocal nuances of bel canto to instrumental performance, creating a bridge between vocal and instrumental traditions. The research enhances the understanding of cross-genre influences in 19th-century music and showcases the artistic versatility of composers like Legnani. To present these findings, the format will include recorded video demonstrations, where specific characteristics of bel canto will be illustrated through selected musical excerpts. These videos will provide a visual and auditory exploration of Legnani’s compositions, allowing audiences to observe the practical application of the research insights. The combination of spoken analysis and video demonstrations offers an engaging and comprehensive understanding of the influence of bel canto on Legnani's works, enriching the overall appreciation of this unique musical intersection.

(English below) Eiras kiosk er ein serie med mindre konsertar, lydinstallasjonar og hendingar som blir annonsert kort tid i forvegen og dukkar opp på stadig ulike stader. Kioskserien er utvikla av Eira Bjørnstad Foss og utgjør ein viktig del av det pågåande kunstnarlege forskingsprosjektet "Performer-Curator" ved NTNU, Institutt for musikk. Eiras kiosk: Skattejakt-edition blei spesiallaga til NTNU Artistic Research Week 2024. Saman med publikum utforska kiosken ulike krinkelkrokar i kulturhuset Olavshallen. Skattejakta tok utgangspunkt i, og er nesten ei realisering av, verket "Ear Piece" av den amerikanske komponisten og utøvaren Pauline Oliveros. Eira’s Kiosk is a series of small concerts, sound installations, and events that are announced shortly before they happen, and pop up in various locations. The kiosk series is developed by Eira Bjørnstad Foss, and forms an important part of the ongoing artistic research project, "Performer-Curator," at NTNU, Department of Music. Eira’s Kiosk: Treasure Hunt Edition was specially created for NTNU Artistic Research Week 2024. Together with the audience, the kiosk explored possibilities for experiences in various nooks and crannies of the cultural venue Olavshallen. The Treasure Hunt was based on, and is almost a realization of, the piece "Ear Piece" by the American composer and performer Pauline Oliveros.