Radio Papesse

We are thrilled to host a radio retrospective dedicated to Soundwalk Collective, whose work we have always admired, so you can imagine how happy we were to welcome them on Radio Papesse with a eight-episodes series, from August 29th to October 17th.

August 29th - Ayahuasqueros | Recordings from the Amazon, 2012 [broadcasted in the in the context of Süden Radio]
A voyage into sciamanism with a radio essay by Jeremy Lopez, featuring Victor Nieto and Ushamano Walter Martinez, produced in collaboration with Francisco Lopez [the environmental recordings you hear are from the Peruvian forest].

September 5th - Ulysses Syndrome: Recording from the Mediterranean Sea, 2008 [broadcasted in the in the context of Süden Radio]
A sound odyssey recording the Hertzian frequencies along the shores of the Mediterranean basin.

September 12th - Kill the Ego | New York recordings 1998-2008
An epic 40-minute-long poem composed of ten years of sound recordings made in New York between 1998 and 2008. Stories from the streets, fragments of intimate and universal biographies of Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx: Soundwalk has captured and woven together the sounds, conversations, and songs of urbanity.

September 19th - Death must die | Recordings from Varanasi India 2004 - 2009
A sound piece that begins before the rising of the sun and reproduces the cycle of a day in Varanasi…Benares, Kashi; a sacred city, where death is everywhere, bathed in light. It is here that Hindus come to die and burn their dead. It is here, on the river’s edges, that the wrath and the grace of Shiva are expressed. The sound intoxicating as death itself, it is a hammering song of the dead, playing until one is transfixed. It's the murmuring of the Ganges…the power of silence.

September 26th - Empty Quarter | Recordings from the Rub' Al Khali desert 2010
The bedouins call this vast barren land the Rub’ Al Khali, literally the Empty Quarter. In this empty vastness, one can distinguish millions of voices, from Bedouins on their voyage though the desert, to oil miners, to the sound of communication between cargo ships and trawlers sailing up the Red Sea, to shortwave radio transmissions along the Persian coast, all the way to North East Africa. The Empty Quarter is the crossroads of the Arabic civilization.

October 3rd - The encounter | Martin Heidegger and Paul Celan in the Schwarzwald forest
Paul Celan visited Heidegger in 1967, in Todtnauberg, in the Black Forest. The poem written from this meeting and which actually has the name of Todtnauberg, was interpreted in a lot of manners: Celan noted a deception, or something else? What did he want, he, the Jewish German, from the one who clearly would have to denounce the Nazi enterprise but from whom the text about poetry was a major reference for Celan?
An audio essay by Jean Luc Nancy.

October 10th - MEDEA | Recordings form the Black Sea
Medea is an original composition based on recordings of radio waves as well as voice and sound fragments collected by Soundwalk Collective during a two-month crossing of the Black Sea, in a sailing boat specially equipped with scanners, microphones and high-range aerials. Medea embarks on a sound reading of a region of the world whose quivering beauty remains cruel and obscure – akin to the ancient Medea.

October 17th - The Only Good System Is A Sound System | Recordings from Berghain, Berlin
A project of sound, architecture and club culture. In April 2012, the Collective was given access to the Berghain club in Berlin and its sound systems. The Collective prepared a selection of frequencies and rhythm patterns that were used to make each part of the building vibrate. By sending frequency sweeps to the sound system, each interior surface of the building reacted by filtering the sound and producing new harmonics, vibrations and textures, that are normally unheard by the human ear.
Listen to a preview and read extra content here

Soundwalk Collective comprises four members: Stephan Crasneanscki (France), Dug Winningham (USA), Simone Merli (Italy), Kamran Sadeghi (Iran-USA).
Created by Stephan Crasneanscki, the Collective’s recent installations and performances were shown at Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris); MADRe Museum of Contemporary Art (Napoli); New Museum (New York); National Museum of Singapore NMS (Singapore); Abu Dhabi: Art, Talks and Senstions (Abu Dhabi); Mobile Art by Zaha Hadid (Hong kong, Tokyo, New York); EXIT Festival at Maison des Arts de Creteils (Paris); Villa de Noailles – Centre d’Art et de Culture Contemporain (Hyères); Gare Saint Saveur (Lille); Palacio Belmonte (Lisbon); KaZantip Republic 2011; Florence Gould Hall (New York); ARMA 17 (Moscow).