Madrid Without Words: A Vibrant Ecology
Radio station: Radio Clásica – Radio Nacional de España (RNE)
Venue/s of the event: Estudio Música 2 -Casa de la Radio
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Madrid Without Words: A Vibrant Ecology
This sound work is part of “Madrid sin palabras: una ecología vibrante” (“Madrid Without Words: A Vibrant Ecology”). Pablo Sanz is currently developing this new project series at the Center of artistic residencies (CRA) in Matadero Madrid, through the first edition of the residency program for experimental radiophonic creation, organized in collaboration with Ars Sonora (Radio Clásica / Spanish National Radio -RNE-) and the Spanish Association for Electroacoustic Music and Sound Art (AMEE).
This project is conceived as a continuing artistic research trajectory based on the exploration of the territories and possible sonic worlds manifested in the contemporary city of Madrid through a variety of environmental listening strategies. The work focuses on what remains usually hidden, on the limits and thresholds of perception and attention. The project thinks the city as an ecological assemblage, in the words of Jane Bennett, an “ad hoc grouping of diverse elements, of vibrant materials of all sorts, including humans and their (social, legal, linguistic) constructions, and also very active and powerful nonhumans: electrons, trees, wind, fire, electromagnetic fields”. The work promotes less anthropocentric modes of listening and thinking, investigating the vitality and creativity of a variety of nonhuman agencies. These agents include architecture, energies, materials, processes, species, technologies, and also sounds themselves, considered as phenomenological beings able to produce affective responses.
This performance, especially developed for the Art’s Birthday Party, is made of sound materials derived from the opening episode in the forthcoming series. The work originates in ambisonic 3D sound field recordings made in rooftop terraces, listening to (within) the city’s air, and from a distance. The composition examines the rhythms of the urban space throughout a twenty-four hours cycle, putting in practice a durational and sensory perspective.
Pablo Sanz is an artist, composer, recordist and researcher currently based in Spain and Northern Ireland. His body of work includes site-specific and public art projects, immersive multichannel installations and live performances in the dark, exhibitions, releases, and pieces for broadcast and headphone listening. His practice is an open-ended investigation of listening, time, space, materiality, non-human vitality and otherness, with a focus on the limits and thresholds of perception and attention.
Through a continuum of approaches, his environmental sound works investigate the vibrant entanglements and creativity of human bodies, non-human creatures, energies, materials, spaces, and technologies, encouraging sensory ecological awareness. Listening becomes a political act, intended to resist dominant tendencies in contemporary societies, cultivating alternative forms of being and thinking.
Pablo’s work has been experienced in diverse contexts throughout Europe, with forays in Australia, the USA, and South America, in places such as CentroCentro, La Casa Encendida, Fundación Juan March, IN-SONORA, Matadero, National Music Auditorium (Madrid); Cafe Oto (London), PS² Gallery and Sonorities Festival (Belfast), Radiophrenia CCA (Glasgow); STEIM (Amsterdam), B93 (Enschede); Künstlerhaus (Dortmund); ZKM Center for Art and Media (Karlsruhe), Gallery Školská 28 (Prague), PRAHA (Brno), VELAK (Vienna), Kino Šiška (Ljubljana), MWW Contemporary Museum (Wroclaw); ACMC Sonic Environments (Brisbane); Brooklyn Acoustic Ecology Festival (NYC), and FILE Festival (São Paulo), among others.
Pablo has received commissions from Radio Reina Sofía Museum (RRS) in Madrid, FoN Air in Cumbria, the Atelier de Création Sonore Radiophonique (ACSR) in Brussels, and R{A}DIO{CUSTICA} in the Czech Radio. He has released pieces in collaboration with Framework Editions (EE), Gruenrekorder (DE), Sonic Terrain (COL), Vacuamoenia (IT), and Very Quiet Records (UK), among other labels and platforms. Grants, awards and mentions include Süden Radio (Radio Papesse, 2017), Santander Mobility Award (2015), INLAND Campo Adentro (2011), Europe: A Sound Panorama (Goethe Institute, Deutschlandradio Kultur, ZKM Karlsruhe, 2011), and the 5th On Air Radiophonic Art Prize (Círculo de Bellas Artes, Madrid, 2009).
Pablo has participated in numerous artistic residencies in Spain, Portugal, The Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Slovenia, Sweden, and Brazil, and has given talks, seminars and workshops internationally. In 2004 he was a co-founding member of Mediateletipos.net, an independent collective initiative devoted to the research and dissemination of aural culture, experimental music and sonic arts. He also worked as an editor in ArteSonoro.org and was the artistic director for the triannual programme ‘Sensxperiment 2009-11: Sensory Immersion’ in Córdoba, Spain.
Pablo graduated at the University of the Arts of The Hague in The Netherlands, working at the ArtScience Interfaculty and the Institute of Sonology. He holds a PhD in Electroacoustic Music Composition and Sonic Arts (‘Environmental Composition Approaches’) by the Sonic Arts Research Centre (SARC) at Queen´s University Belfast (Northern Ireland, UK), where he is currently a Visiting Research Fellow.
– ART'S BIRTHDAY – 
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