SUSTAIN.BERLIN
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13 & 14.10.2023
LIEBIG 12
BERLIN
Sound and music have always had the capacity to create connections – between ideas, places, and people as well as within us. The interacting global crises we face are fundamentally rooted in the challenge of connecting across diverse perspectives and ideas, often set in opposition. It is more important than ever to explore the potential role that art can play in opening up imagination around possible just and sustainable futures and bringing these into being.
sustain.berlin is two days of workshops for artists on connecting sustainability to their sound and music practice. And two evenings of live electronic performances showcasing different approaches to bringing sustainability to life.
13.10 Workshops - Doors open 12.00, Intros and Welcome 12.30
From producer to performer for under 10€ - Eira
12.45 - 14.45
Producing and performing electronic music should be open to all, but many consider the expensive and time-consuming step of buying and learning hardware to be a prerequisite. However, there are so many avenues to breaking into live performance that can use the same tools that you already use for production. This workshop will primarily focus on Ableton Live Lite with TouchOSC - a powerful and beginner-friendly setup which requires only a laptop of any kind plus a smartphone of any kind and costs less than 5€ - but many alternate and eclectic setups will be touched upon too, including smartphone-only setups, faux-modular setups with VCV Rack and live performance with the Nintendo Switch.
Sonification, field recording and sampling: recording and processing natural (and un-natural) sounds - Katharina Bévand
15.00 - 17.00
What is sonification and what can we learn by making inaudible sounds audible? We will dive into the exploration of electromagnetic waves as an artistic tool - which electronic frequencies are around us and what can we learn by listening to them?
Sounds of our environment are - literally - all around us, above us, and below us. How can we bring these sounds into our productions and performances? How can we give voice to those who are not heard and seen? This workshop dives into the process and practice of field recording, sampling, and sound processing. Bring along your own recorder or use your phone to get hands on with sounds.
13.10 Performances - Doors open 19.00, Performances 19.30
drusnoise & Erbse - Can you hear the Earth breathing?
Eira
Felipe Vareschi
14.10 Workshops Doors open 12.00, Intros and Welcome 12.30
Spatial audio recording. production, and performance - Felipe Vareschi
12.45 - 14.45
This is a practical workshop where attendees will explore a variety of techniques that aim to see space as a tool for composition. If you are interested in going beyond the boundaries of your DAW with your compositions this is the right workshop for you!
In this workshop attendees will build a cohesive composition by positioning, moving and capturing field recordings, electronic soundscapes and electro-acoustic feedback loops in space.
Improvisation, sonification and integrating DIY electro-acoustic instruments - JacqNoise
15.00 - 17.00
In a lot of sustainability work, there is a focus on planning and command & control approaches. This works OK until the unexpected happens - warmer temperatures than expected, more rainfall, more big storms - then the system breaks and can't handle it. What is needed are systems that are adaptive and resilient - that can improvise in the face of uncertainty. This workshop explores ideas of improvisation in performance with tips and techniques for adaptive performing. We also explore different ways to setup and translate data expressing the urgency of making our environment more sustainable. And dive into electro--acoustic options to create analog-digital surroundings and present sounds that still have a link to the earth and sustainability.
14.10 Performances - Doors open 19.00, Performances 19.30
JacqNoise
Katharina Bévand
sustain.berlin is generously supported with financial support from Ecosia and space provided by Liebig 12
ARTISTS
An amazing collection of artists giving workshops and performing live
JacqNoise
In her compositions, JacqNoise is looking for the spot where rhythms cross each other’s paths. She is deconstructing sounds in order to understand the symphony and the themes that are reflected in it. During live performances JacqNoise synchronizes with her surroundings. She finds her main source of inspiration in cultural cross-pollination. In the past years, JacqNoise has collaborated with musicians from all over the world. This is leading her curiosity to experiment and adapt new methodologies. Jacky is curator at Berlin Modular Society, founder of Berlin Noise Festival, initiator of Hijack parties.
Katharina Bévand
Sound artist based in Berlin. She creates site-specific sound installations, sound sculptures, 3-D sound environments and performs on modular synthesizers. In 2017 she was honored by “bonn hoeren – sonotopia” of the Beethoven Foundation for Arts and Culture Bonn. In 2021 she was part of Goldrausch Project for women artists. Her collaborations oscillate between the fine arts scene and the experimental and electronic music field. In 2022 she directed the first sound art oriented artist residency Cráter in La Palma, Canary Islands funded by the GOETHE Institute. Since 2022 she teaches sound art and modular synthesis at Berlin School of Sound.
Erbse
Erbse (no/ all pronouns) is active in the fields of visual arts, music, dance and philosophy, is queerfeminist, is learning, exploring and experimenting. A reason for all these descriptions point to a cornerstone in Erbses's work: researching power relations and fixed labels, about demarcation through categories, anthropocene perspectives. At the same time Erbse is attempting to create interconnectivity and a blurring of boundaries as resistances. Erbse is based in Berlin and Bremen and currently prefers to work with dance and social sculptures.
Felipe Vareschi
Felipe Vareschi is an Experimental Electronic Musician, Performer and Mastering Engineer based in Berlin. Their work explores the way people interact with each other through objects, with a particular focus on the interactions between individuals, technology and nature.
Felipe Vareschi is developing a new musical language where interactions between electronics, sound objects, performers, and installation sites mimic social interactions and human-object networks. Inspired by the physical and imaginary sounds of everyday life, Felipe aims to empower listeners to value and participate in the soundscape around them and embrace the noise of interconnected life.
Eira
Eira performs live improvised industrial hard trance, based in Berlin. They are part of the collective ‘éclat crew’, a music-making collective for female, trans, and non-binary electronic music producers.
drusnoise
Steve Williams aka drusnoise is a live, electronic music producer, sound artist and co-founder of Berlin Modular Society and is curator of sustain.berlin. drusnoise integrates analog modular synthesizers with digital FX and organic samples to create a style that flows from lush ambient tones to gritty techno. drusnoise also releases and performs experimental sound art works incorporating field recordings, sonified climate change data, and feedback loops. Known in the outside world as Dr. Steve Williams, his academic work includes conducting and publishing research on sustainable energy transition in Canada, Germany, and Sweden.
Liebig 12
Born in 2011 somewhere in the core of Berlin Friedrichshain, Liebig12 is an Atelier & community oriented_initiative run by Allegra Solitude in collaboration with numerous and diverse local and international Actors. Inspired by empirical approaches, Liebig12 acts as a cross disciplinary laboratory encouraging the exchange between artists, curators, re#searchers, cultural activists & flaneurs. A work in progress Wunderkammer within a private & public identity, individual & collective, interacting with_in its surrounding social-urban context.