NAISA‘s longest running festival will feature outdoor sound art exhibitions at the NAISA North Media Arts Centre as well as on-line events at http://www.naisa.ca/.
“NAISA introduces its new programming theme Digital in Nature, which is prompted by a reflection on the pervasive presence of digital technology in public life that plays out in parallel to a compulsion to leave the technology of the city behind and disappear up north to be closer to the natural world. The works curated for this year’s Sound Travels Festival slide in and out of different points of tension in their relation to digital technology and nature.” — Darren Copeland, Artistic Director, New Adventures in Sound Art
3 interactive outdoor artworks presented throughout the summer at NAISA North Media Arts Centre in South River
My Place Here and Now (Who am I Today?) by Port Sydney filmmaker Sandy McLennan is an interactive window installation opening on June 3rd that captures the environment and character of South River with digital soundscape recordings that are activated by sensors embedded in photographs created using vintage analog pinhole cameras. The content was created as part of a series of workshops with students from the South River Public School in March 2020.
Also opening on June 3rd is Sounding Bodies by Jonathan Tyrrell, which is an immersive outdoor instrument where materials tremor with vitality; where voices and sounds both familiar and strange, intimate and immense, emerge and offer reflection on what it is to live in South River.
On July 29th, the Mycorrhizal Rhythm Machine by Tosca Terán (aka Nanotopia) turns a Grow Room into a Fungi and Sprout music generator. Fine electrodes placed within roots of Endo (and some Ecto) mycorrhizal plants, receive bio-data and translate this activity into notes which trigger actuators that strike, strum and rattle creating a symbiotic symphony of sound!
Alongside the above exhibitions will be a second iteration of Audio Bench, a set of two outdoor picnic tables equipped with listening devices and Porch Radio, where you can experience sound art while enjoying takeout coffee and snacks from NAISA’s café. This year’s sound art works will be on the theme Digital in Nature.
For your online listening pleasure at home
NAISA will be hosting a special 24 hour online broadcast on July 18th featuring soundscape compositions by Canadian and international artists on the theme “The Unquiet Earth.” World Listening Day is an international event organized by the World Listening Project and it takes place annually on the birthday of seminal soundscape educator and composer R. Murray Schafer. Also, on August 14th, NAISA will present an online listening party on Whereby to celebrate the 2nd Sound Travels Soundcloud Album being launched on August 14th at 7 pm.
On August 28th, NAISA will broadcast a 24/7 Livestream on NAISA’s Youtube channel of music by Tosca Terán (aka Nanotopia) derived from mycelium in the South River area. Electrodes are used to record biodata and translate that to MIDI in realtime which is brought into synths and signal processing.
Throughout the year NAISA has other online programming on NAISA Radio (http://naisa.ca/naisa-radio/), Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/user/NAISAtube) and Soundcloud (https://soundcloud.com/naisa/). Also check out Making Waves (https://naisa.ca/media-archive/making-waves-wgxc-radio-show/), a monthly podcast and radio show.
New Adventures in Sound Art is a non-profit sound art organization in South River Ontario that is funded in part by the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council and the Department of Canadian Heritage.