Research Catalogue

Art activism is powerful. Also known as activist art, protest art, visual activism, artivism and creative activism, it changes lives, situations and is and has been a powerful weapon across a whole spectrum of struggles for justice. Teresa Sanz & Beatriz Rodriguez-Labajos(2021) relay that art activism has the unique ability to bring cohesion and diverse peoples together and it can, as Zeynep Tufekci notes, change the participants (2017). As Steve Duncombe & Steve Lambert (2021) posit, traditional protesting such as marches or squats are no longer as important as they once were. As a result of my own lived experience in activist activities, I very much agree with Andrew Boyd & Dave Oswald Mitchell (2012) that the reason people use art activism is that it works, by enriching and improving protest. In the past, when I lived in a metropolis and was not a parent, I used to be an activist. Now I no longer have immediate access to international headquarters at which to protest and I have to be concerned with being arrested, I am hindered from protesting. This project is an attempt to increase inclusion and widen access to art activism. By devising methods which include at least one of the following: that do not require on-site participation, that can take place outside the public gaze, that reduce the risk of arrest, that open up protest sites that are not “big targets”, that include remote locations, that involve irregular timing, my thesis aims to increase inclusion and widen access to art activism to those who are underserved by more mainstream methods of conducting art activism. Textiles have unique properties that enable them to engage in subterfuge and speak loudly through care and thought(Bryan-Wilson, 2017). They have strong connotations of domesticity, the body and comfort that can be subverted within art activism to reference lack of this domestic warmth and protection(O’Neill, 2022). Being a slow form of art-making, they show care and thought, attention in the making, so that the messaging is reinforced through this intentionality in slow making.

Dérive (2017) for string quartet and live-electronics explores the aesthetic consequences of different ideas of the role of subjectivity in sonification processes, the concept of dérive (drift) and the notion of musical structure as a translation of a real physical space.

How do you imagine a new kind of theatre? Where terror is not a genre, but a collective and emotional ritual. At its core lies the relationship between character, costume, and monster. Starting from the concept of an art of the underground, the research explores how fear, trauma and memory shape creation. The character wears a costume to be seen, but it is the monster — emerging from the subconscious — that speaks the unspeakable. He work unfolds through drawing, material collection (feathers, petals), costume prototyping, 3D modeling, and the creation of a short videogame demo: this builds emotional attachment to the protagonist, who will later return in a theatrical performance, turning the stage into a ritual of recognition. Not a political theatre. Not a moral one. But a theatre of the deeply human — where the audience no longer watches, but witnesses.

Research Through Art & Design course introduces a variety of approaches, methodologies, issues and concerns in research through practice. In this course, research through practice refers to a broad continuum of artistic research approaches, arts-based, practice-led and -based research approaches, including also constructive design research approaches that are relevant across practices in Aalto University ARTS School of Arts, Design and Architecture. This exposition was created within an Artistic Practice Workshop offered as an additional part of the main course. During this part of the course, the students are familiarised with the Research Catalogue. During the workshop, participants work on their page within a group exposition, drawing connections between the creative and the given or discussed literature from the course and their creative practice.

As artificial intelligence continues to advance, its role in the creation of music has raised profound questions regarding the nature of authorship and the ethical implications of algorithmic composition. Exploration of a fast-evolving relationship between music and AI broadens researches` horizons on the transformation of creative processes and the challenges it presents to traditional creativity. Delving deeper into the ethical considerations surrounding the ownership, originality, and emotional authenticity of machine-created music plays an important role in the understanding of modern music industry and helps to navigate creative development in today’s reality. Ongoing ethical aspects of AI presence in music and creative industry show the importance and actuality of this topic. This paper aims to provoke a deeper understanding of how AI is reshaping musical creativity and to encourage a critical dialogue about the future of art in a digitally driven world.

This thesis presents the outcomes of my artistic research conducted as a master’s student in the Improvisation and World Music Performance program at the Academy of Music and Drama, University of Gothenburg, Sweden. The present study investigates how a musical identity is constructed and reshaped over time, drawing from my background as a Brazilian singer, guitarist, and songwriter, and examining how exchanges with musicians from different fields and exposure to new artistic inputs can influence my creative practice. Central to the research is finding tools to broaden my expressive possibilities within the song format, through the integration of improvisation, diverse ensemble instrumentation, and inventive strategies for communicating artistic intentions and political concerns through music and stage performance. This work also explores possible approaches for overcoming creative blocks and performance-related fears, especially those related to improvisation, seeking to cultivate a state of freedom, openness, fulfillment and joy while playing.