Update 20 March 2020:

Due to current circumstances, Arts House’s Makeshift Workshop: How Things Sound Matters has been cancelled. Participants have been contacted.

For further information or enquiries, please contact Arts House on 03 9326 3720.

Read a statement by Arts House’s Artistic Director Emily Sexton here.

Long-term collaborative team Madeleine Flynn and Tim Humphrey lead a Makeshift Workshop that recasts our understanding of listening in public, shared and unusual spaces.

Driven by their ongoing curiosity about the possibilities of listening in public, this workshop will explore the use of semi-intelligent and AI technologies as a tool for audience involvement in the creation of sound works. Artists will bring to the gathering their own creative obstacles – a problem that is blocking the progress of an idea – and through a peer-to-peer, collaborative commons approach the group will seek resolutions that point the way forward. Artists will also be invited to bring 30-minute playlists of their own to investigate the ways in which the hows and whys of listening are intricately connected to where it takes place.

Over three days this deep dive into the contexts, motivations and actual experience of sound will provide both concrete, hands-on knowledge of emerging technologies including AI and a broader understanding of the field of sonic and participatory art.

Who is it for?
We welcome artists from all disciplines. This workshop is geared towards artists considering listening, sound in site, composition and spatial considerations and implications of these considerations for form in their practice.

How to Apply
This Makeshift Workshop can support up to 12 participants. It is important that participants can commit to attend all three days. Participants are provided with a $300 stipend and lunch each day. Lead Makeshift artists determine the application and selection process for participating artists.

Deadline for applications:
The online application asks you to consider these questions in relation to working with sound, listening and working with others:

– Where do ideas come from?
– What is your current connection to sound/listening/music practice?
– What do you think the future of group listening is?

About the Artists
Madeleine Flynn and Tim Humphrey are leading Australian artists who create unexpected situations for listening. Their work is driven by a curiosity and questioning about sound in human culture and seeks to evolve and engage with new processes and audiences, through public and participative interventions. Their practice intertwines local, national and international relationships. They have an award winning long term collaborative practice. In 2017 their practice was awarded the national Australia Council Award for Emerging and Experimental Artforms. Their work has been presented and commissioned widely internationally including: Setouchi Trienalle, Japan; Theater Der Welt, Germany; Brighton Festival, UK; Sonica Festival, Glasgow; Asian Arts Theater, Gwangju; Incheon Art Platform, Seoul; Sydney Festival; Melbourne Festival,; Asia TOPA,; Perth Festival; MONA FOMA; Kennedy Center, Washington USA and ANTI Festival, Finland amongst many others. Their current areas of interest are the sound of existential risk, the audio agents of artificial intelligence in public space, and long form socially engaged public art interventions.

For questions about this Makeshift, please contact Sarah Rowbottam – Producer, Arts House. Email sarah.rowbottam@melbourne.vic.gov.au  or call on (03) 9322 3720