Research Catalogue

Transmutations seeks to redefine the term transformation through a staged concert — a concert conceived as a work of art in itself. The traditional concert format and conventional performance practices are showing signs of stagnation, thus calling for the emergence of a voice adapted to this transformation. The boundaries of music, especially within the classical realm, have gradually blurred in recent times. Increasingly, artists are exploring the concert as a form of expression that not only integrates other artistic disciplines but also embraces technological advancements. This approach challenges traditional aesthetic conventions and the notion of genre and musical style. The omnipresence of technology in contemporary society underlines the need for research that explores the many possibilities of the concert format. This staged concert aims to redefine the concept of transformation by avoiding any stylistic boundaries. The works of Richard Strauss, John Cage, and Alexander Schubert are included not only for their artistic value but also for their contribution to the very notion of transformation.

Artistic research project: "Resisting Gentrification: In-situ Performative Protests in Trešnjevka Neighborhood"

My Bachelor's project investigates the spellbinding Sufi music practices by questioning and comparing its origins and traditions in two culturally significant locations: Syria and Morocco. It is interesting in the various but spiritually connected manner of two prominent Sufi orders—the Qadiri Boutchichi Tarika in Morocco and the Naqshbandi Tarika in Syria. These orders not only serve as spiritual guides but also play a central role in preserving and disseminating the unique art of Sufi music. This artistic research consisted of different steps. I interviewed two Sufi musicians, the first one from Morocco and the second one from Damascus. The questions were focused on the differences and the similarities between the two cultures, instruments, melodies, and rhythm. I studied Sufi music from Arabic sources as well, so I had to translate many important historical facts, taking into account the ethics of the research. I relied on my musical background in this research as part of the Syrian Sufi music and on my tours during Sufi music festivals, where I met Sufi musicians from different countries. Being a seasoned Sufi music practitioner myself, I tried to add a personal touch to this work based on my experience. I found many cultural differences between the two Sufi music styles, but I found many similarities at the same time. Two countries in different places far from each other have wide cultural diversities, but the same rhythm is the key to making the conversation with the divine. Dhikr is a mutual element as well, even though it has some special details related to the geographical region. Keywords: Sufism, Sufi music, Morocco, Damascus, Universal, History

Home page of the Journal of Sonic Studies

The Grand Tour Experiment: A Transformative Traverse of the Picturesque Landscape was a human-pulled carriage journey that re-envisioned the eighteenth-century traverse of the picturesque landscape, the subject-objectification of the view, and the imperialistic impulse behind the voyage pittoresque. This artistic experiment visually, kinaesthetically, and performatively explored the transformation from landscape to image that formed the basis of modern perception, as part of the colonial legacy inherent within the picturesque view. The Grand Tour carriage was pulled by human labour, evidencing the forced labour economy that impelled the European Enlightenment, while demonstrating in human terms, the use, abuse, and commodification of human and non-human animals. The Grand Tour proceeded from Binche to Brussels to Antwerp, Belgium in 2022. The Grand Tour experiment investigated the eighteenth-century picturesque gaze, which travelled unchecked over the landscape in industrialised Europe, a harbinger of the annexation and enclosure of land that had been commonly owned, traditionally used, or publicly accessible, while portending the colonisation of lands abroad. The picturesque gaze, an imperialist mechanism, still fragments the landscape, excising two-dimensional pictures from the three-dimensional world around us, a vestige and augur of the destruction of lands, cultures, and peoples. Shifting between early modern and contemporary perception, The Grand Tour bisected space and time in a cleaving manoeuvre, creating new fault lines in which multiple planes of space-time might co-exist. This experiment tested whether a new neo-picturesque framework could be forged in a dimension of space-time that alters according to the perception and orientation of the traverser, casting contingent new imaginaries into physical and psychic realms where they may or may not become realities, according to Arno Böhler’s philosophy as artistic research approach (2019). This experiment envisaged a plurality that did not exist in the eighteenth century but may have already been limned in its myriad contradicting, contrasting, and diverging modes of sensing and experiencing the world around us in a relational and now relative notion of space-time. Download Accessible PDF

This exhibition presents an investigation into the folk music and dance practice polska, involving a group of Swedish folk musicians and dancers. The investigation employs optical motion capture (mocap) to explore interactive music and dance performances and create innovative artistic expressions by merging traditional practices with contemporary media technology. As a musician working closely with the dancers he plays for, the author explores ways to mediate dance through the sonification and visualisation of movement data. The focus is on the fundamental connection between sound and movement in this performance practice, particularly showcased in the project's centrepiece, Dancing Dots. Documentations of this and other works included in the exhibition present live music and dance with sonic and visual displays derived from mocap data, asking how such multi-modal mediations can facilitate understanding of the interplay between movement and music and open new avenues for artistic expression in this folk music practice. The use of optical motion capture is contextualised as a means of mediating music-dance through narrow streams of movement data, and the exposition introduces a web tool for accessible sonification of folk dance. The exposition applies music and dance theoretical concepts in designing the movement mediations, examines their relevance in an artistic context, and grounds the results in a practice-based understanding of the rhythmic/metric framework of the Swedish polska. Download Accessible PDF