linda's – blog

As part of the Hebden Bridge Arts and Ecology Festival Open Space 70, I was asked to create a sgundwlak and sound mapping workshop. I was supported by the amazing Paul Knight, philosopher and land walker, to create a walk that would bring a group of people through a changing landscape of urban, rural and wild, where we would discover the traces of our anthrophony on the bio sphere, and then following this walk create sound maps of this journey. During the walks I introduced my listeners to three female listeners to enhance their listening experience, and to discover different ways of measuring their sonic experience from an ecological, sensory and personal perspective. They were Pauline Oliveros, Hildegard Westerkamp and Rachel Carson. I then explored my own approach to listening developed as part of my research.

Below are some images from the journey as well as some of the amazing maps my participants created. I constructed these little booklets to allow them write some of their experiences on the back, during the walk, and then map on the other side. It was a great day and I am so thankful that being part of the Propeller Ensemble Performance for the same festival allowed me the opportunity to create and run this workshop.

In 2020 I began a conversation with the composer Jack MacNeill of the propellor ensemble. He was interested in the work I had been doing in the field of acoustic ecology and the sound arts, particularly my community engaged approach, my focus on excluded voices, and the way I created outputs from performances, to installations and publications, in order to reach as wide an audience as possible. These conversations struck a real chord, as they allowed me to begin to explore the personal impact the research had on my everyday life. Sometimes to explore difficult topics you step a little outside yourself, perhaps as a coping mechanism. To have such a long and deep conversation allowed for a form of self reflection, and over the course of the past two years, I have placed these thoughts into the performances that Jack and the Propeller Ensemble have created and for which I have been invited to perform alongside with the absolutely amazing ecologist and ornithologist Mark Cocker. So in July this year I performed alongside Mark, Jack and two additional performers from the Ensemble at the Hebden Bridge Festival Open Space 70.  We performed together last year at Lancaster Arts, but this felt like an evolution and refinement of how we collaborate on stage. All of this stems from the podcast series Jack created as a result of conversations with a variety of arts, ecologists and theorists, and they are a staggering creation that can be accessed here.   

Below is a series of snapshots from that performance, listen through or skip through, but its a lovely piece to watch or listen to.

For best experience listen on headphones, or play on large screen with good speakers, preferably at head height.

In 2022 April, I participated in a collaborative project at the Ceramic House Brighton, with ceramics artist Juss Heinsalu, exploring the concept of Edges and Peripheries. This was supported by funding from Creative Scotland and iPortunus. Through a series of experimental conversations, and text-based communication, we began to ask, ‘what constituted life’, ‘intelligence’, who defined that, and how anthropocentric were our definitions? This was shaped by my own research into using genetic editing, with the Non Random Collective, as an adaptation response to climate change and the ethical implications of that.
What emerged was an idea about how we might take an experimental leap to create new definitions of life, explore new modes of communication, think about how life might have formed many hundreds of thousands of years ago, hybrid forms of life connected to stone, soil, rock, plant, and animal. In response to the theme, I created the film Continents Drifting and Juss, a large scale ceramic work created.

These works are the first in a set or series of works that we will continue to examine going forward, but here is a sample of the works we developed for the Brighton Festival Open House exhibition.

So thrilled that I received a funding grant from Creative Scotland to develop an R&D project with two collaborators, Tony Doyle and Ashley James Brown, we have become the collective known as Non-Random (website to come soon). We have been awarded £33000 to spend a year undertaking research and development for a body of early stage art works in response to the gene editing technology CRISPR. This is an incredible opportunity to develop an idea we’ve been working on for 2 years. See below for info on our project idea. We will be creating a number of events, talks and and interactice online art works for experimentation going forward. We will be sharing on our new social networks soon.

Evolving Ourselves

Evolving Ourselves with Unnatural Selection is a new collaborative project between artists and researchers that will explore and present some of the ethics and future implications of gene editing through a digital multi-arts approach.

Presented primarily via an online digital platform incorporating machine learning techniques and a variety of cutting edge digital arts tools, the project looks at bringing together research, data science, visual arts, sound and language into an experimental toolkit and set of frameworks that presents the project findings to a wider public audience in the shape of playful online interactive interventions. The project fosters an open dialogue between artists, disabled voices in the community and researchers that seeks to navigate the ethical, empirical and creative challenges around the sensitive topics, while bringing the artistic concepts and thoughts into a general public audience’s hands for investigation and conversation.Through a participatory approach, the project gives a focus on giving underrepresented voices in the community a chance to shape and share their experiences through creative artistic expression.

The project will serve as a springboard for future creative arts investigations into how the arts and cultural collectivity can be vital in helping share some of the world’s most complex scientific problems.

On the 24th of October the performance Women in Space took place in the Edinburgh Sculpture Court at Edinburgh University. This piece co-designed by myself, Sophia Lycouris and Isabel Nogueira involved bringing a selection of women together, artists, performers and theorists, to occupy a space shaped by patriarchy and colonialism. Our performance was inspired by an ideal to bring only the voices, sounds, bodies and text of women into the space. It was part planned, using text to inspire action and activity, and interpretive, to allow these actions to encourage others. Our performance also focused on the gaze, instead of being observed as performers, we reached out to our audience, spoke to them, encouraged them to participate, and we looked at and spoke to each other.

This performance followed from a visit and talk given by Prof Isabel Nogueira at the School of Art, Edinburgh University. She discussed the role of gender within Brazil in shaping women’s relationship to performance, music and technology. She also spoke of the exclusion of women of colour and ethnic groups of Latin America and the work she has done on gender and performance. I have worked with Isabel on a number of projects in Brazil and was incredibly excited to create this performance in Brazil. Women participatring included other lecturers from the university, PhD and postgrad students from the school of art and the school of art history. To watch a section of the performance take a look at the vimeo link.

So delighted and excited that I received the arts council International Travel Award to undertake a large artistic research project with Prof Isabel Nogueira and Dr Rebecca Collins.

While there we will explore the subject Sounding the Feminist Body examine new approaches to exploring the history of women’s participation in the sound arts in Brazil, develop new practice based techniques, resulting in the development of a new body of work, and an innovative methodology for community outreach projects. The visit includes network meetings with curators, producers and activists in Salvador, Rio De Janeiro, Sao Paulo and Amazonia. Activity in Brazil is supported by a follow up meeting in the UK to present talks, performances and workshops.

So far our schedule is pretty busy, but looking forward to meeting up with many sound artists, composers, performance artists and community groups.

Jesse Seay; Knitted VU Meter; 2014; Image courtesy of the artist.

I am delighted to present the fifth issue of the Interference Journal, an issue for which I was the lead editor. This was quite an intensive experience taking the lead on a special issue, since 2009 I have worked as an editor, which comes with its own responsibilities but being in charge of the shape of an entire issue is a whole other ball game. Really enjoyed the experience though, and will definitely be up for doing it again in the future.

This issue of Interference asked authors to consider sound as the means to which we can explain the sonic. Contributions to the study of sound, apart from practice-based works, are often disseminated through language and text. This is the case for most analysis or research into sensory based and phenomenological studies. There is of course a strong case to be made for text; it is the universal way in which contemporary knowledge is transmitted. But perhaps there is an argument to be made for new ways to not only explore sound but to disseminate ideas around the sonic. For example, in what way can ‘sonic papers’ represent ideas about the experience of space and place, local and community knowledge? How can emerging technologies engage with both the everyday soundscape and how we ‘curate this experience’? What is the potential of listening methods as a tool to engage community with ‘soundscape preservation’ and as a tool to critique and challenge urban planning projects? Please click here for the journal.

As part of Ev&A, Ireland’s Biennale, Christine Eyene was commissioned to curate an exhibition at the Ormston Gallery in Limerick Ireland. She selected me to create a responsive work to a text, The Murder Machine by Patrick Pearse, an Irish philosopher, thinker, educator and writer and one of the leaders of the 1916 uprising in Ireland.  I found this text fascinating and appended another to it, the 1916 Irish Proclamation of Independence.  Both documents were completely unfamiliar to me, and I found it fascinating that very little of these early events in Irish history, or writings relating to them, were taught to me in school.  Responding to these texts meant thinking about what it means to be a colonised nation, and then to examine post colonial concepts. What emerged from my research was an idea around different types of colonisation.  In Ireland post civil war and independence the catholic church began to play its role of domination over Irish culture, politics, education, gender, sexuality and even thought control. This new form of social control engendered further suppression within society, and for women in particular, meant a colonisation of the body and equality.

This is a quad piece, spatially mixed using spectral synthesis applications on an IPad.

(To listen to stereo version of the work go to the RTE broadcast here, at 1hr:33min. in the presenter starts to discuss the work and then plays the total piece)

The work involved me talking to different women and asking them if they remembered learning these texts or what they knew about the rising, most said they knew very little, that it had little or no impact on their daily lives and that they felt that perhaps they should have known, like it was a blank spot in their history. To me, the further suppression of the equal rights and freedoms of women that occurred after the civil war and independence from Britain has in fact meant that we remained a colonised group whose identity was shaped by those who had no interest in our needs or rights. Though a lot has changed in the past twenty years there is still a great need for more change and for more women’s voices in the fight for equality within Irish society. This only occurs through accessing knowledge and understanding that the fight for our rights is not a new concept.

I worked with composer and sound technologist Tony Doyle to spatialise the piece, it was really important to create an immersive and moving sound work.

I would like to thank all of the people who contributed their voices and thoughts to the making of this work. Sheena Barrett, Fionnuala Conway, Jennie Guy, Brona Martin, Susanne Smith, Sarah O Keeffe-Nolan, Harry Moore, Scot McLaughlin, Mick O Shea, Andrew Quick, Charlie Geer, Ian Heywood, Gerald Davies and Tony Doyle. Finally a thank you to Christine Eyene for inviting me to create a work responding to the text by O Casey, it has been a wonderful learning experience.

The next wiswos event is happening and I am very excited about it. This time we hope to generate real ideas concerning women’s visibility in sound technology and sound studies. If anybody is interested in having a look at what it is about this time and who will be there then go to the website here, I am so glad I started this organisation and that a whole bunch of vastly interesting people came on board to help, it has been so rewarding.

Women in Sound/Women on Sound Symposium 2015

CALL IS NOW CLOSED

This symposium explores the practice, influence and prominence of women who work in and have contributed to the field of sound studies. IT takes place on the 13th of November 2015 from 10-7 at Lancaster Institute for the Contemporary Arts (LICA), Lancaster University. Attendance is free and you do not have to submit to attend. 

NEWS THE OCTOPUS COLLECTIVE IN COLLABORATION WITH COMPOSER BRONA MARTIN WILL BE PRESENTING THEIR CONCERT FULL OF NOISES ON THE EVENING OF THE SYMPOSIUM) THIS IS FANTASTIC NEWS

Works presented will include paper presentations and audio installations.

IMPORTANT: THIS IS A NETWORKING EVENT SO ATTENDANCE FOR PAPER PRESENTERS/SUBMITTERS OF SOUND WORKS IS MANDATORY. THERE ARE NO FUNDS AVAILABLE FOR TRAVEL, HOWEVER, THERE IS NO CHARGE TO ATTEND THE EVENT.  

Women’s role in sound has largely been excluded from academic texts. The author Douglas Kahn in his seminal work, Noise Water Meat, noted that there have been no ‘fruitful studies of females’ in sound and/or music studies, though there exist numerous contributors to various sound disciplines. However, there are now some seminal texts that have been written by women on sound, which have contributed to various fields of sound studies from ecology to music technology and listening practices. These authors include Pauline Oliveros, Andra McCartney, Hildegard Westerkamp, and Emily Thompson, to name a few. There are also publications which have sought to give voice to those working as creative sound practitioners such as the books Her Noise and Pink Noises: Women on Electronic Music and Sound.

Nonetheless, what has emerged in recent studies is the increasing lack of women participating in sound events, especially those technologically driven (Oudshoorn and Pinch 2003; Oudshoorn, Rommes, and Stienstra 2004). There is evidence that gender exclusion for various social reasons has played a role in shaping young females participation in sound, music and technology (Armstrong 2011; Born et al. 2014; Cooper 2006; Gauntlett 2008). We hope that this project will have an impact on the wider role of women in sound and music by supporting those who work in sound and giving voice to those who have contributed historically. Following the symposium the Interference Journal: a journal of audio cultures, will publish a special report on the event.

Submission details

Suggested subjects and fields of research interest include, but are not limited to the following: music technology, sound art, acoustic ecology, sound within cultural studies, anthropology, sociology, media theory, acoustics, and phenomenology. Please submit an abstract of 200 words max for paper and sound submissions. For sound submissions we can accept works for stereo,  headphone works and audio video works, please submit 2 min sample of the work (only one submission per person) via a yousendit or web download link such as dropbox.

All submissions must be sent to l.okeeffe@lancaster.ac.uk by 12 midday on the 1st of October. You will be notified of acceptance by 7th of October.

IMPORTANT: THIS IS A NETWORKING EVENT SO ATTENDANCE FOR PAPER PRESENTERS/SUBMITTERS OF SOUND WORKS IS MANDATORY. THERE ARE NO FUNDS AVAILABLE FOR TRAVEL, HOWEVER, THERE IS NO CHARGE TO ATTEND THE EVENT.  

Okay, so to register to attend the symposium go to eventbrite page. Places are limited so only register if you definitely can attend.
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/women-in-soundwomen-on-sound-symposium-2015-tickets-18697540848

Finished generator

Parts

The Manual

I was delighted to take part in the Yorkshire Sound Women Network’s first soldering and synthesis workshop in Huddersfield. This was a fantastic treat, to be both taught by women and to work with women in the construction of a stepped tone generator. I haven’t soldered in a few years, and there are really important things that it was good to be reminded off. Cannot wait now to give my own soldering workshop at LICA to art students building contact microphones.

Windmill La Fatarella

Recording Windmills La Fatarella

Dry Scrub crackling on the ground in 40c

The windmill skyline

This summer I travelled to the North East of Spain in the Cataluna region, I was hoping to record the hot soundscape as an opposition to the my cold sounds of Iceland. instead of focusing on what heat does do the sounds of nature, which I did actually explore, I came across a very changed landscape to one I had seen almost 8 years before. The skyline of the Terra Alta region, a spectacular mountain area which is located within the Ribera d’Ebre region, was covered in wind turbines. This beautifully large and graceful machines for harnessing the wind, came to dominate my recordings, images of which can be seen above. The sounds they produced was also amazing, and one wonders how much this affects the wildlife. There is a constant whir, whir, whir, which is hypnotic.  These sounds alongside my recordings of the electric energy of Iceland will be intriguing material to work with for the next year.

Words on the exhibition

Although the exhibition features a significant amount of audio, a large part of the show was concerned with the physical space of the gallery. Each room represented a different way to experience sound, and all of the objects had a clear connection to the sounds in the space. It was hoped that the listener would engage with both, not seeing sound and space as separate.

The second large space works with a material I have used since 2006, Panphonics sound showers©. These speakers are used to create directional sounds and work best with the human voice. In the exhibition the speakers are directed in to the corners of the room pushing the sound into the centre bypassing and merging with each other. The sounds create a representational or imagined space of memory and experience collected from participants of this project.

The objects in the gallery, old radios, gramophones, the cast iron lamp post, were iconic representations of how sound was experienced from the 1940s to the 1960s (street lamp posts were used as antennas for transistor radios, by urban teenagers, so as to be able to pick up international radio signals).

The work, in its examination of the impact of mediatisation from this period, found that just like today, sound, music and technology were used to re-appropriate space by urban teenagers. Audio technologies allowed them autonomous listening spaces as well as access to media, news and music, from other countries.

The sound works within the show were a mix of stories told by older people from Dublin’s inner city,  the voices of individuals remembering singular significant sonic moments, and a montage of old radio sounds from the 1930s to the 1970s.  One could experience an inner and outer sonic event as you moved through both the sounds and the space.

This work is grounded in both Thompson’s (1995*) concept of mediatization and Lefebvre’s symbolic spaces.   Lefebvre (1974**) argues that a space becomes what users imagine and emplace. Sounds define the rhythms of a place, they create patterns of meaning and regulate daily activities. In this way sound is an integral part of productive space, as “space is listened for, in fact, as much as seen and heard before it comes into view” (Lefebvre 1974:200).
(video to follow shortly)

* John Thompson, The media and modernity,Stanford University Press, 1995

** Henri Lefebvre, The Production of Space, Wiley-Blackwell, 1974

Opening Reception: Friday 14th November at 5pm at Leitrim Sculpture Centre, Manorhamilton

spaces of sound and radio spaces

The Launch of Derry Soundscapes at U3A 2014

A lovely reception was organised by the staff at U3A in Derry to launch the CD Derry Soundscapes with sounds and compositions created by Sam Burnside, Florence Forbes and David Canning with a little help from myself.

Audio Snapshots
Track 1 Belfast Rose by Sam Burnside music by Linda O Keeffe

Track 2 My Kind of Music by David Cannin

https://soundcloud.com/linda-o-keeffe/my-kind-of-music
Track 3 Song in a Café with Bells by Florence Forbes

https://soundcloud.com/linda-o-keeffe/song-in-a-cafe-with-bells

Just found out that I was awarded the IRC post Doctoral Award New Foundations, this is very exciting because it allows me for the first time to work creatively with the theoretical ideas formed during the PhD. I will be working with older people in a performance context, I will be teaching them audio recording and editing for live sound performance and/or installation. Cannot wait…