jul _23
highlights: graduation - project, thesis, grad show, and research award + surprise!
You most probably already know, but YEAH, I GRADUATED! The last month was a crazy rollercoaster of emotions, countless hours of work, many glasses of wine, sleepless nights and anxious mornings, wonderful moments with some of my favourite people! Crazy, indeed.
It’s one of those times when so much happened that made you speechless. You are so overwhelmed by your emotions that it’s hard to express your gratitude, happiness, and fears. You simply get stoned. It will take a while before i manage to process all of it, but what at least i can do now is to show you what are the outcomes of my work during the last academic year.
Here we come… :) Brace yourself, this is a suuuuuper long letter :D
Hugs,
ål // ≧◉◡◉≦
[p.s. i will take a break in August, so the next letter will arrive in September]
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[grad project]
for my graduation project, i decided to try something completely new for me - to create a mixed-media publication that will accommodate the 5 sound jams i facilitated over the last year. It has to be a form that can contain the information about the processes i facilitated, the annotations of what happened, the visual scores, but also the audio files. Considering the lack of access to CD players these days, i decided to play with the format of a CD case but disrupt it - to use the box as a nostalgic reminder of my teenage years of collecting and recording CDs, but put something more accessible inside. The result is a case that has 6 booklets [laser and riso print on kasaka 90 gram paper], a memory SD card [containing the 5 sound jams] and 2 paper clips [a particular model from my primary school years]. On the cover there is a little joke - a funny, trashy sticker “deluxe edition” as a reference to the collection CDs in which there are more sonic pieces than the usual edition.
This deluxe edition celebrates the launch of sound jams - a series of facilitated collective sound-based publication makings that I started doing as part of my master’s course research. In this case, you will find the first five editions of the sound jams: the stories behind the making, highlights from the process, visual scores, illustrations and, of course, the sonic pieces (on the micro SD card as well as accessible through a QR code & web link).
You can check it out on my website. Will be on my online shop in August, but if you want to pre-order one, email me <3
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[master’s thesis]
Sound Jams // Methods of Collective Sound-Based Publication-Making for Practitioners from Various Backgrounds follows my master’s research on exploring ways to facilitate group sound-making experiences. By sound jam, I understand any facilitated process of sound-making and publishing that includes more than one person. Its core principle is inclusivity: it is open to people with or without musical training and offers a structure in which everyone is invited to find a suitable role and space for experimentation. The process grants the makers the opportunity to create a sound publication as a group. My master’s thesis paper explores five sound jams as applied methods that provide such processes and a safe space for makers to open up to a moment of collective sound-making and sharing.
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[grad show]
_radio shows
Across two evenings XPUB shared their work and research through interviews. Interviews here were interpreted in different ways by each student - they structured dialogues, discussions and bubbles of thought, mixed with infomercials and sonic material that shares more of our practices. The radio shows were a teaser to invite the listeners to our graduation show. They were hosted by Ål Nik [Alexandra Nikolova] and Gersande Schellinx and aired on Radio WORM on June 23rd and 27th.
The radio shows were facilitated together with the amazing Gersande - we invited our classmates to do audio contributions [and they did amaziiiing ones!], also recorded some pieces together [infomercials, interviews, introduction to the show etc.] and afterwards i edited & mixed the two shows.
_sound installation
Sound Jams // Listen and Respond was a cosy, bubbly corner that invited the guests to spend a little time with (some of) the five Sound Jams. They could have a look at a sample of the audiozine publication. The visitors were also invited to respond to what they listened to by leaving an audio recording. The setup took place as part of Experimental Publishing's graduation show at Slash Gallery (Worm) between 29th of June and 2nd of July.
For the installation, the visitors could listen to the 5 sound jams, read the booklets that are part of the deluxe edition publication, and also to respond by using an audio recorder. Also, they could read extracts of my master’s thesis and see my master’s research notebook [it is a very special object to me, because it was solely dedicated to the research and was the place where i drafted my ideas, concepts and to-do lists; it also gave me the opportunity to create my whole new annotation & taking notes system which i intent to keep in my research & art practice from now on].
_blob shop
together with my whole class, we also installed our own bubblications shop! Why a shop? Well, this year, for the first time, due to budget cuts, we did not have any funding for our graduation projects [compared to amounts such as 800-1000 eur before]. Even though, we still decided to invest in our work and besides many hours of labour, we also spent quite some money on production costs. Thus, Sound Jams publications and my classmates works are for sale. We will bring these amazing goodies to fairs and publishing festivals as well and hopefully, will at least have some return on investment.
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[master research award]
During the last year, Erica Gargaglione and i initiated a group research into exploring ways to continue working collectively, expand the new skills and practices they embraced during our study at XPUB, and discover opportunities for artists (collectives) in the Netherlands (and Europe). The assessment panel decided to support this project that we call “XPUB3” with the Master Research Award: Experimental Publishing! Thus, thanks to this appreciation, we now have also a small starting fund for our explorations and collabs in the Autumn :)
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★ new ★ [monthly sonics]
if you managed to reach it to this point, you deserve an award :D Now, seriously, there is a new little thingy i would like to try out during the next few months. Since i’ve been working a lot with sound [art] during the last year, i was also encouraged by my tutors at my final assessment to think of how to create something like a podcast. However, there is some resistance in me to do it in the “traditional” way, so i will first start with some small sonic experiments. And then will see what happens.
This will emerge after the Autumn. But just before i go on a Summer break, i wanted to add a little teaser and share the sound publication i created as a wrap up of Room for Sound 2022-2023. I had a lot of fun coordinating this project at Willem de Kooning Academy and i am forever grateful to Naomi Jansen, who picked me last year to take care of the project!
Room for Sound was a 10-day residency inside the Willem de Kooning Academy for students, teachers and other staff of the WDKA and the PZI. The room was used to either start a new artistic project or work on an existing one. In exchange for the room, the resident was asked to record a sound a day: this could range from an in-depth talk about the work to a short observational soundscape. The sounds were uploaded daily to the mywdka homepage so that the academy community could tune in to what’s happening inside the Room for Sound.
During this academic year (2022-2023), the residency welcomed 14 bachelor and master students who used the opportunity to work on their current research and elaborate on their work using the medium of sound. For some of them it was a brand new media, for others - a moment to dive deeper into their interest in the audio format.
What was especially precious for the residents this year, was the chance to have their own place to work at the academy. The room is not a sound studio, but a working space which each one of them could decorate and transform the way they needed it. Most of them also shared that the invitation to create and publish one sound per day was a helpful push and constraint not to get lost into the endless opportunities out there.
During this academic year, the Room for Sound became of home of more than 120 sonic pieces and accommodated plants, illustrations, collective murals, couches, cushens, laughs and conversations. To wrap up the residency, I made an audio mix with selected snippets by the residents.
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[all the links in one place]
▶ XPUB grad projects are available here. So many amazing and peculiar discoveries await here, take the time to browse through all of our experimental works, it’s worth it, i promise :)
▶ the presentation of my grad project is here.
▶ my master’s thesis is here.
▶ our grad-warm-up radio shows are here.
▶ all my master’s programme documentation is here.