urban sound stories, curated by Gruenrekorder; online at kunstradio and Gruenrekorder :: on air @ Ö1 Kunstradio, Sundays 11:03 - 11:45 pm (CET).

urban sound stories is a five-part series of sounds and photographs as soundscapes of European cities. The artists participating in this “curated by”project were selected by Gruenrekorder, a German based organization and label for phonography, field recording and soundscape.

Five sound artists — Simon Whetham, Tobias Bolt, Eric Cordier, Lasse-Marc Riek and Roland Etzin — explore eight places each, in five different cities, using the means of phonography and photography. The exploration of artificial and natural space within the city takes place within the same space of time. Continue reading

6th Annual Conflux Festival :: Submissions Deadline: August 15.

Conflux, the art and technology festival for the creative exploration of urban public space, is pleased to announce the 6th annual Conflux Festival will take place from September 17-20, 2009. The festival, produced by Glowlab, will be headquartered in Manhattan with partner and host, NYU Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development.

Conflux will organize a user-generated open format event on Sunday September 20th, 2009 from 10am-6pm. Through an open submissions process, ConfluxCity will provide a platform for artists, urban geographers, technologists and others to organize and produce innovative activities dedicated to the examination, celebration and (re)construction of everyday urban life.

Street pianos are appearing in cities across the world. Located in skate parks, industrial estates, laundrettes, precincts, bus shelters and train stations, outside pubs and football grounds, the pianos are for any member of the public to enjoy and claim ownership of.

This summer 30 pianos will appear in London and London City. Who plays them and how long they remain is up to each community. The pianos act as sculptural, musical, blank canvases that become a reflection of the communities they are embedded in. Many pianos are personalised and decorated. You can find maps of the locations in London and London City at: http://www.streetpianos.com/london2009/ Continue reading

Routes + Routines Follow Blind Workshops by Peter Westenberg and Wendy Van Wynsberghe (Constant vzw) :: July 15, 2009; 10:00 am - city walk starts at Timelab - Sint Pietersnieuwstraat 23 - 9000 Ghent :: To participate email summercamp [at] timelab.org.

This workshop is a detour through the city of Ghent guided by environmental data. Fit up with a self-made antenna, city walkers are dwelling through the electromagnetic fields of Ghent.

Part 1: EMF Antenna: After a contextualization of the workshop by a presentation and introduction of EMF, participants will make their own EMF antenna. Tools and material are provided by Constant. Duration: 3 hours. Continue reading

Dana’s work is always so delicate, inspiring and challenging. Here is her WildUrban Radio. My take on it is that you just need to turn the knob to listen to a variety of birds from your area. The radio is mapped directly to your location and you can hear the smallest species directing you closer to them whether you are going North or South …. I have ordered one of those from her and will update on my productivity level asap. [posted by Cati Vaucelle on Architectradure]

FUTURESONIC 2009 — Urban Festival of Art, Music and Ideas :: May 13-16, 2009 :: Manchester, UK.

Now in its 14th year, Futuresonic is an international festival featuring world premiers of astonishing artworks, an explosive city-wide music programme, and visionary thinkers from around the world. Featuring 50,000 festival visitors and 300 artists at 100 events in a city-wide urban festival experience.

Art: Futuresonic’s 2009 art programme is more ambitious and relevant than ever. A forest in the gallery grown from Joseph Beuys’ acorns, a project engaging the population of Manchester in monitoring climate and biodiversity, and John Lennon’s Imagine ringing out on cathedral bells in Liverpool. Themes include society, technology and the city plus this year Environment 2.0. Art exhibition across Manchester and beyond, centred at the CUBE Gallery. Continue reading

Carl Stone + Aki Onda + Mystery Guest :: East Living in West Meets West Living in East :: March 13, 2009; 8:00 - 11:00 pm :: Roulette, 20 Greene St., New York, NY.

Carl Stone is an American who lives in Tokyo. Aki Onda is a Japanese living in New York. Both work with field recordings and urban soundscapes in their individual and unique ways, recorded and performed using media ranging from low-tech tape cassettes to high-tech multi-channel flash recorders. Be there for this first time collaboration, when they will also be joined by a special guest from Japan.

Sensing City: Urban Rhythms Influence a Musical Performance in Real-Time :: February 14, 2009; 9:00 pm :: Atelier Fachhochschule Meppen, Schliemannstrasse 37, 10437 Berlin.

Sensing City is a live concert by an eleven-piece-ensemble which is influenced by urban rhythms, namely the movement of cars outside the concert venue. As the passing cars trigger the rhythms that are being played, the city becomes audible through the musicians, even when the urban dwellers are part of the composition unknowingly.

A city has its own rhythm that affects the life of its people and is at the same time created by them. Bus schedules, traffic lights and the turn signals of cars are familiar patterns to the citizen. This interplay between creation and inspiration takes place at the heart of the music.

Watch a short preview here. Images of the concert are also available here. Thanks: information aesthetics.

Colony ::: symbiosis … electronic light + sound flash mob :: December 12, 2008; 8:00 - 9:00 pm :: Life.Lab, Digital Harbour, Corner of La Trobe Street and Harbour Esplanade, Docklands, Melbourne, Australia :: Rain or Shine!

You are invited to participate in a multiplayer performance within Colony, an interactive urban art environment. Bring your iPhone, borrow a friends or steal one and download the free Colony app from the App Store. Up to thirty people may simultaneously play the urban art environment and feed energy to the media creatures that inhabit it. Each of the totems in the networked sculpture may be played like a musical instrument responding to touch with light and sound.

Colony, by Troy Innocent (weathering steel, acrylic, computer-controlled light, 12-channel sound, interactive installation, iPhone web app), is part artificial lifeform, part icon of a digital media landscape. Continue reading

Going Public ‘08 - Port City Safari: The Sound of the City by Zafos Xagoraris, Piazza Garibaldi, Sassuolo :: until December 21, 2008 :: aMAZElab Via Cola Montano 8, 20159 Milano, Italy.

Starting from the text by the famous writer Italo Calvino ‘Le città invisibili/The invisibile cities’, The Sound of the City intends to map the city through a collection of sounds / silence / noises which are typical of specific areas: the suburbs, schools, markets, squares. The project intends to create spatial and functional surveys for the definition of an idea of architecture and space referring to today’s acoustic ecology and sociology. Zafos Xagoraris’ work can be seen both as an architecture and a sculpture in the public space. His sound installation will be presented in the main square of the city Piazza Garibaldi with a transmission of sounds from different port cities. Continue reading