Shared Empathy in collaborative Improvisation – Reciprocal creative interactions between musicians of divergent musical and cultural backgrounds
(2025)
author(s): Jean Beers
published in: Research Catalogue
Abstract
This Research Catalogue exposition with audio-visual examples documents ongoing research into artistic interactions helping to ascertain and streamline prosocial and empathic behavior in groups with divergent backgrounds and modes of thinking and how these skills can benefit the artistic endeavors positively.
Promoting intersociality and an empathic approach to collective music making amongst individuals who represent different schools of musical thoughts and styles or expertise, as well as bringing to the table divergent cultural backgrounds and individual characteristics is the aim of Ensemble Improvisation Experimentell (E i E), founded and lead by me at the Music and Arts University of the City of Vienna (MUK) since February 2021.
In a world of pandemics, climate crisis and war it may seem idealistic, even fanciful, to search for moments of ‘shared empathy’ or creative symbiosis amongst musicians in professional exchanges and its influence on artistic experience and outcome, without immediately searching for ways of dimming the fire of destruction through war and climate crisis that our global society faces. However, finding micro-solutions through artistic endeavors and promoting a more sustainable future for the arts themselves in general, and specifically for the genre of contemporary music, is a valuable goal and tool for infiltrating humanism with sustainable thinking and acting patterns.
Extensive video and audio documentation of practice sessions and performances, as well as exemplary images are attached to this exposition.
Stretching Fiction: in a language-based and visual artistic practice
(2025)
author(s): Mike Croft
published in: Research Catalogue
The project is a semi-graphic notification of the artist/author’s initiatives to stretch fiction – so-termed analogous to the stretcher component of an umbrella – in his language-based and visual practice. The referenced time-frame is from 2014 through 2025. The contention is that if one considers oneself as subject within one’s work, amidst whatever the work's more objective concerns, then it is a fairly obvious next step to third-person oneself – in the sense that a writer such as Fernando Pessoa invented heteronyms. While in visual practice such a prospect is, arguably, more difficult to articulate, a fictional element instilled in art- or other academic writing already has certain precedents in more experimental writing in the latter fields. If, as in the artist/author’s case, such writing is an adjunct to one’s visual practice, then a fictional characterisation of oneself as another can comment on and variously inhabit one’s visual work. Unlike how characters often populate fiction, however, the artist/author’s strategy is to only partly develop them, hence having them oscillate as, themselves, a question of relevance.
RAILWAY PUBS
(2025)
author(s): František Javorský
published in: Research Catalogue
This project explores the cultural disappearance of Czech railway station pubs—once vibrant, affordable communal spaces where different layers of society met. As gentrification and modernization erase these places, the project treats them as social relics: through photography, objects, gestures, and staged re-enactments, it asks what is lost when shared public rituals fade. The research approaches the railway pub as a vanishing cultural microcosm. The aim is not only to document, but to interrogate the meaning of these spaces for both national identity and personal memory.
Engaging with plankton
(2025)
author(s): Jana Thierfelder, Patrick Müller
published in: Research Catalogue
If you enter a natural body of water you are not alone. No, you are surrounded by millions of little creatures, namely Plankton. Plankton are minuscule organisms that drift in water, including oceans, lakes, and rivers. They can be microscopic or slightly larger and are classified into phytoplankton (plant-like, producing oxygen through photosynthesis) and zooplankton (animal-like, feeding on other organisms). From a biodiversity perspective, they are a crucial part of aquatic food chains, supporting marine life. From a science perspective they can be indicators for water quality which again indicates for shifts in the ecosystem.
Plankton defies easy classification: Unlike taxonomic categories based on genetic or evolutionary lineage, “plankton” is a transversal descriptor, uniting vastly different organisms by a shared condition: drifting. This movement-defined category crosses biological kingdoms, blurring lines between plants, animals, and other life forms. In this sense, plankton queers categorisations and binarities. Ecologically, plankton plays a crucial role: it forms the base of food webs and regulates global carbon cycles. As such, plankton are sensitive indicators of environmental change.
In a projectweek, artists from Zurich University of the Arts collaborated with experts on plankton from Eawag (Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology). The exchange offered gaining a deeper understanding of the creatures that surround us when we swim, for example in Lake Zurich or the Limmat. A documentation of the results of the artistic encounters with plankton are made availeable in this exhibition.
The projects in this exhibition emerged from a collaboration between Zurich University of the Arts, Master in Transdisciplinary Studies, and Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Research.
Participating artists: Anna-Tia Buss, Julia Dorsch, Anna Lena Eggenberg, Micol Favini, Luisa Kühne, Ke Ren, Leila Saad, Domenico Shadlou.
Facilitators / Hosts: Patrick Müller, Marta Reyes, Jana Thierfelder.
Guests: Francesco Pomati, Riikka Tauriainen.
Cecilia Arizti, an inspiration to grow
(2025)
author(s): Lisa Maria Blanco
published in: Codarts
This research focuses on the analysis of three piano works by Cecilia Arizti, a pioneering Cuban composer and pianist from the 19th century: Vals Lento Op. 8, Barcarola Op. 6, and Reverie Op. 16. Arizti, a highly respected musician of her era, demonstrated profound technical mastery and musical depth in her compositions. This study aims to explore the structural and harmonic intricacies of her music, with the goal of applying these insights to the development of my own compositions.
The investigation involves a detailed analysis of the melodies and harmonies present in the selected pieces, alongside an exploration of Arizti's compositional style. To deepen the understanding of her work, the research integrates information from multiple sources, including historical recordings, expert interviews, and scholarly literature. These materials provide essential context and support for the musical analysis, offering a comprehensive view of Arizti's artistic contributions.
The findings of this research culminated in the creation of three original compositions: Vals Cubano, Punto de Barcarola, and Habanera para Cecilia. These pieces, inspired by the case studies and musical experiments conducted throughout the project, reflect the stylistic elements of Arizti’s work while incorporating contemporary elements of my own compositional voice. Ultimately, this study highlights the enduring relevance of Cecilia Arizti's music and demonstrates how historical analysis can inform and inspire modern creative processes.
Forum Artistic Research Proceedings Demo
(2025)
author(s): Hanns Holger Rutz
published in: Research Catalogue
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