Research Catalogue

This research is rooted in nihilism, exploring how the contrast between materiality and spirituality leads to a radical way of perceiving existence. What does it mean to be unable to believe in "what's beyond"? What role does the body play in such an issue? Starting from philosophy, this debate finds expression through art and different iterations, attempts to face the consequences of nihilism.

This research work is a practice-based enquiry that investigates the use of the saxophone in Middle Eastern music and in Makam-music in general. This research will not focus on a specific style, but on all aspects common to the various regional styles included within the Makam-music macrocategory. Characteristics such as microtonality, modality, ornamentation and a specific type of phrasing are in fact common to a very wide variety of musical styles, present in a geographical region ranging from the Balkan peninsula to Anatolia, the Arab world and North Africa. In this research I focused on the saxophone's technical possibilities of producing microtonal notes, which are fundamental to all makam-music. To do this, I analysed the approach of various performers, consulted some experts on the subject and self-analysed my own approach, developed over five years of studying this type of music. As a proof of concept of this work, I recorded three improvisations. On my practical outcome, I carried out analysis work together with the network of experts.

This is the working document of a six-month residency with the Sound and Image Research Centre at the University of Greenwich, summer 2025, funded by the Arts Council England DYCP program. As an exposition, it records the field trip element of the project and begins to explore the role of spatial audio composition and installation in forging deeper relational connections with place. Ultimately, it asks whether the spatial audio encounter alters the subjective position of the human listener towards a more posthuman subjectivity. As the project evolves more will be added with the hope of an eventual live performance of selected compositions and a broader exposition on the role of field recording as a compositional method.

This exposition is part of the series The Sonic Atelier – Conversations with Contemporary Composers and Producers, dedicated to exploring the evolving role of the composer in the twenty-first century. Through a Q&A format, the project investigates how contemporary creators inhabit hybrid identities at the intersection of composition, performance, production, and technology. This interview features Caroline Shaw, American composer, violinist, singer, and producer, whose work moves fluidly between concert music, studio production, and film scoring. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Partita for 8 Voices, Shaw combines historical sensibility with experimental curiosity, creating sound worlds that merge the human voice, instrumental gesture, and digital texture into a single expressive continuum. In the conversation, Shaw reflects on the interconnectedness of composing, producing, and performing; on the role of technology as both a creative and tactile medium; and on the shifting perception of time, form, and space in contemporary music. She also discusses the relationship between notation and sound, the dialogue between acoustic and digital realms, and the value of presence, collaboration, and shared listening as vital counterpoints to digital mediation. Shaw’s reflections reveal a vision of music as a living organism, at once human, technological, and emotional, where composition, sound design, and performance converge into an embodied act of imagination and connection.

Desire Machine is an artistic research project that examines collaborative creation through the conceptual framework of Deleuze and Guattari’s theory of assemblage and desiring machines. Developed as part of the Atlas of Smooth Spaces research initiative, the project explores how movement, sound, and algorithmic systems can function as heterogeneous components within a non-hierarchical and non-representational assemblage. Real-time body data, generative soundscapes, and responsive lighting are integrated via a recursive feedback structure, allowing for emergent behaviours and dynamic modulation across media. Rather than focusing on disciplinary integration, Desire Machine proposes a co-functional space defined by distributed agency, where artistic production unfolds through competencies and material relations. The project offers a methodological proposition for rethinking compositional practice as a site of continuous negotiation, transformation, and becoming.

RESPONSIVE SPACE – SOUNDING INTO MATERIALITY (2014–2020) is an in-depth research project into the interrelationship between us and our surroundings. The artworks can be described as large sculptural sound installations which blur the lines between visual art, performing arts and sound art. The works explore space, material, sound, body and time as equal parts in a composition. The main artworks of the research INTERFERENCE, RESONANCE, SEDIMENT, PLACE 1 and PLACE 2 are in a variety of ways inquiries towards an expanded experience of the dialogue between presence and materiality. The artworks are composed environments which respond and take shape and form from their surroundings, seeking to touch proximity zones where we as humans can sense aspects of being closely intertwined with our surroundings. The act of listening is of central importance in the artistic survey. Olaussen stages space utilising the mediums of sound, minimalistic sculpture and dramaturgical structures. This exposition is part of Gunhild Mathea Husvik-Olaussen’s artistic research project Responsive Space – Sounding into Materiality (2014–2020) at the Norwegian Theatre Academy, Østfold University College. The project complies with the guidelines for the Norwegian Artistic Research Programme from 2019. Artistic practice and reflection are at the heart of the research programme. Originally published in Norwegian in 2019, this work has now been translated into English by Peter Cripps, with the support of the Norwegian Directorate for Higher Education and Skills.