Research Catalogue

Improvised ambient music making is a multi-dimensional process where the musical and the artistical skills are implemented into a dance between the mind of the performer and the creative use of technology. Both the mind and the machine together create a symbiotic relationship which over a course of a longer improvisational process produces a calming effect on the body and the mind, a sensation which in this artistic research is referred to as ”the slow buzz”. Over an 18-month period from June 2023 to December 2024 I practiced the creation of improvised ambient music by keeping a routine which included mechanical guitar warm ups, a meditation session and a recording session for an improvised ambient music track. This routine laid a solid foundation for my artistic work, generating all in all 360 improvised ambient tracks, which were all listened and analysed along the way. All the know-how and the musical style that emerged from this routine eventually led to the creation of a continuous, flowing form of improvisational live-ambient music. I then rehearsed, filmed, and analysed the resulting ambient music 40 times during the autumn of 2024 in order to gain insight into the mindstates that are affiliated with the creation of improvised ambient music. The final outcome of this artistic research process was then to be presented in the form of a solo concert during the Global Spring Festival, on the 15th of May 2025.

What senses arise from sensing? How does sensing affect the processes of sense-making? How can the density of senses be navigated through writing? This exposition retraces a specific sequence of thinking-in-the-making designed to address such questions in a collective workshop setting, where writing and sensing alternate in an iterative process.

This exposition presents a format designed for experiencing writing as a relational process in a workshop setting. It is based on implementations that have taken place in different contexts in the fields of higher education and research in the arts, and is intended as an invitation to further adopt and adapt the format in transversal settings.

HACKING SOUND SENSORIALITY_how to build embodied sound objects for electroacoustic music with lofi techniques Disembodiment is not new and does not only exist because of the current technological reality. It is an experience that various practitioners, in the field of music, experience constantly. The composer/producer/musician/sound designer moves the material. The listener only perceives its virtual representation. How to bridge the gap between the bodily experience of sound creation and its fruition and further (re)creation in the virtual world? By using synesthesia in the creation of an object-based sound method and vocabulary with the use of lofi techniques. A synesthesia of sensory roots to place the body-cosmos at the centre of sound, to make this simulacrum of identity a bridge between the articulate and the inarticulate, between the real and the virtual. Lofi thought, with its techniques for creating and modifying sound, has a new vision of technology, linked to knowledge and memories of the body. The aim is to design a new vocabulary of tools and methods for the creation of sound objects with different degrees of embodiment. These sound objects will be designed to live in two worlds: in the disembodied world of the virtual and in the material world of corporeal sonority. The article explores the use of a practical and philosophical hacking that does not colonise the new virtual sound territories, emptying them of resources and meanings, but amplifies them through the semiotics of the ancient territories of the body, in order to make them habitable and fertile.

In this exposition, I invite you to the process of research carried out in the tapestry manufactory in Valašské Meziříčí. It aims to find out how to convey tapestries' craftsmanship, mediality and materiality through filming and post-production. The theme of transformation is essential: the transformation of the tapestry into a film image, but also the transformation of painting or graphics, which were the precursors of the tapestries woven in the manufactory. I am also looking for ways to use a primarily representational medium to achieve an effect of presence through materiality and corporeality. In my research, I interlace observational passages with stylized ones that emerge from a creative dialogue between the materiality of different media, artistic techniques, or post-production interventions. These methods can deepen not only the viewer's experience but also the documentary testimony and convey an almost tactile encounter with the filmed reality. Finally, based on practical experience, I distinguish working with materiality in film into three analytical cuts. V této expozici zvu do procesu výzkumu, jak skrze natáčení a postprodukci filmu o gobelínové manufaktuře ve Valašském Meziříčí zprostředkovat řemeslnost, medialitu a materialitu tapisérií a recipročně i filmové technologie. Podstatným je tedy téma proměny. Proměny tapisérie ve filmový obraz, ale i proměny malby či grafiky, které byly předobrazem v manufaktuře utkaných tapisérií. Paralelně hledám možnosti, jak pomocí média, které je primárně reprezentativní, docílit skrz materialitu a tělesnost účinku prezence. Ve výzkumu střídám observační pasáže se stylizovanými, které vzešly z tvůrčího dialogu materialit odlišných médií, výtvarných technik či postprodukčních zásahů. Tyto metody mohou prohloubit nejen divácký prožitek, ale i dokumentární výpověď a zprostředkovat až taktilní setkání s natáčenou skutečností. Nakonec na základě praktické zkušenosti rozlišuji práci s materialitou ve filmu do tří analytických řezů.

Este ensaio tem como objetivo apresentar uma reflexão, em forma de registro de memórias sobre as experiências relacionadas à obra "Terceira Mão", tanto em seu aspecto simbólico quanto em sua materialidade. Esta investigação artística insere-se no contexto do doutoramento em Artes Plásticas na Universidade do Porto. A primeira mão segura a matéria, o tocável A segunda mão segura o espírito, o sensível A terceira mão segura a todos nós, é o que todos temos em comum. Segura eu, você e o outro, em uma rede de tafetá, ligados à terceira mão e a todos. Os olhos ligam a percepção do material com o sensível espiritual. Percepção simbólica visual. Olhar para o interior. Ver além do visível. Toque etéreo. Gesto de benção. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This essay aims to reflect, in the form of a memoir, on the experiences related to the work Third Hand, both in its symbolic aspect and materiality. This artistic research is part of the context of my doctorate in Plastic Arts at the University of Porto. The first hand holds matter, the tangible The second hand holds the spirit, the sensitive The third hand holds us all, it's what we have in common. It holds me, you, and the other in a taffeta net, connected to the third hand and everyone. The eyes connect the perception of the material with the sensitive spiritual. Visual symbolic perception. Looking inwards. Seeing beyond the visible. Ethereal touch. A gesture of blessing.