NAISA Video Archive

Hydra evokes the quiet strength of plant beings by re-imagining their lives in a short video fiction. Slowly but surely, the plants no longer look like plants and become more like aquatic or mineral beings. In this meditative and benevolent 3D alter-world, plants explore the ambiguity of their own identity.
Véro Marengère is an audiovisual artist that lives and works in Montreal/Tiohtià:ke. Evolving between 3D video art and experimental music, her practice reflects on storytelling and the relation we have with the virtual aspect of life. Her colourful and sensitive style recalls contemplation, hybridity and fragmentation. She has presented her work at PHI Center, MUTEK, OFF Festival Jazz, AKOUSMA, POP Montréal, Cafe OTO and many more.

Postcard is a sonic message reflecting a state of mind, a nostalgic attempt to find an older more reliable way to communicate with a friend. Some of the sounds were recorded in Santiago Chile a couple of days before the world shut down. Busy subways and city sounds are interlaced with sounds recorded during total lockdown at home.

Edgardo Moreno is a Hamilton based composer that has been commissioned for projects in Canada, Venezuela, Colombia, Mexico, Sweden, Argentina, England and USA. He has worked extensively with contemporary dance choreographers creating sound design and musical scores. He is presently working in creating video and live sound pieces that are part of his Fireflyproject.

Peinture Noire is an experimental video that reimagines the viewpoint of viewer and subject, presenting a documented act of painting in a way that re-frames the digital content as slices of information from specific space-time: across the time-based media, everything that happens at a line in space becomes abstractly apparent. Acadian artist Herménégilde Chiasson paints Peinture Noire; adjacent views are differing viewpoints of the video sliced through time, derived by original computer programming by Laura De Decker. Similarly, Stefan A. Rose slices and extends each brush stroke’s sound, using layers of granular synthesis, spanning the video’s duration and act of painting.

Herménégilde Chiasson is an Acadian visual artist, poet, playwright, filmmaker, and former New Brunswick Lieutenant Governor. Many of his books have been translated into English, including the pivotal 1974 publication Mourir à Scoudouc, and the 1999 Governor General’s Literary Award winner for poetry, Conversations. He lives in Grand Barachois, NB.

Laura De Decker is an artist who writes her own computer programs to create abstract images, video, and virtual 3D environments. She was artist-in-residence for CAFKA (Contemporary Art Forum for Kitchener + Area)/Christie Digital and at the Institute for Quantum Computing, University of Waterloo. She lives in Dorchester, NB.

Stefan A. Rose is a poet, photographer, and multimedia artist. He was 2010 City of Kitchener Artist-In-Residence, his video collaborations with Penderecki String Quartet were presented in concert internationally, and his 2008 poetry chapbook won the Alcuin Society Canadian Book Design Award, poetry category. He lives in Dorchester, NB.

Lake Composition connects the mystifying beauty and impenetrability of the Georgian Bay shoreline to the experience of falling in love, and to the ways AI is teaching us about who we are as desiring animals at once a product of and alienated from the nature we are continuous with. An arrangement of field recordings, drone footage, interviews, AI-generated audio and imagery, Lake composition documents natural forces at work on clay and human bodies. The aleatoric melody of clay ‘played’ by wind and waves grounds this multi-channel work exploring the relationship of self to nature and the digital spaces forcefully articulating our lives through desire.

April Martin is a process-based sculptor working in ceramics, textiles and metal. In 2016 she completed her MFA in Sculpture at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. For her, making is the gesture that most reflects the energy of living things; this includes weather, wind and water.

Ben McCarthy’s practice plays out a dichotomy between embodied and intellectual pleasure in the context of precarity and polycrisis. Through experiments in emerging technology, he addresses the perceptual and subjective affordances of increasingly networked and enclosed media. With sound, text, and documentary he thinks through the social and economic conditions that produce the listening subject.

Videovoce’s Laurel MacDonald (vocals and video) and Phil Strong (sound design) have a nearly two-decade long history of musical collaboration.

Their most recent is in the Videovoce performance project, integrating MacDonald’s live vocals with electronics and video. Videovoce features Strong’s distinctive sonic signature and MacDonald’s otherworldly vocals as together they create lilting, pulsing, multi-layered sight and sound environments.

Videovoce was presented by New Adventures in Sound Art for the SOUNDplay Festival on November 10, 2012 at the NAISA Space, Wychwood Barns, Toronto. It is included in a 20th anniversary video collection of performances and other events produced by New Adventures in Sound Art – https://www.naisa.ca/

Artistic Direction: Darren Copeland
Video Camera: Stefan Rose
Video Editing: David Arthur

The SOUNDplay Festival in 2012 was supported in part by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, The Department of Canadian Heritage and The SOCAN Foundation.

“Power Play” was created and performed by Anna Friz, Christine Duncan, Richard Windeyer and Richard Lee with contributions from Gregory Whitehead. The performance was directed by Mark Cassidy and was produced by New Adventures in Sound Art (NAISA) for the Deep Wireless Festival.

The performance was recorded at The Drake Hotel in Toronto, Canada by Stefan Rose (video) and John Magyar (audio). The video was edited by David Arthur and directed by Darren Copeland.

The Deep Wireless Festival of Radio and Transmission Art in 2006 was supported in part by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, The Department of Canadian Heritage and The SOCAN Foundation.

“Hear Now Here” is an excerpt of an improvised performance by James Bailey, Allison Cameron and Dan Tapper that happened on May 2, 2015. The performance was produced by New Adventures in Sound Art (NAISA) for the Deep Wireless Festival. The full audio of the performance can be heard at FIX THIS HERE

James Bailey is an improvising sound artist living in Toronto. His main practice involves found objects and/or electronics as well as standard instruments played in unconventional ways. He is, and has been, involved with several small performance groups during the last twenty years but had been recording solo works for nearly twenty years before that.

Allison Cameron is a composer and improvising musician. Her music has been performed nationally and internationally and, celebrated in Musicworks Magazine, The Wire (UK), I Care if You Listen, and Exclaim! among other publications. She is part of the improv trio c_RL (curl) with Germaine Liu and Nicole Rampersaud and, since 2013 has been an avid field recordist. (www.allisoncameron.com)

Dan Tapper explores the sonic and visual properties of the unheard and invisible. From revealing electromagnetic sounds produced by the earth’s ionosphere, to exploring hidden micro worlds and creating imaginary nebulas made from code. His explorations use scientific methods alongside thought experiments resulting in rich sonic and visual worlds.

The video of this performance is part of a 20th anniversary video collection of performances and other events produced by New Adventures in Sound Art – https://www.naisa.ca/

The performance was recorded at NAISA Space, Artscape Wychwood Barns, Toronto, Canada by Stefan Rose (video) and Matt Miller (audio). The video was edited by David Arthur and directed by Darren Copeland.

The Deep Wireless Festival of Radio and Transmission Art in 2015 was supported in part by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, The Department of Canadian Heritage and The SOCAN Foundation.

“Scies” is a composition for saw blades and electronics by Sonia Paço-Rocchia. It was part of the Sound Travels Festival in August 2017 in Toronto.

“Scies” was part of a performance entitled “Object Response” where Paço-Rocchia and also Alan Bloor performed solo works exploring the resonant properties of saw blades and other industrial metals that cut.

This video is part of a 20th anniversary video collection of performances and other events produced by New Adventures in Sound Art – https://www.naisa.ca/

Composition and Performance: Sonia Paço-Rocchia
Artistic Direction: Darren Copeland
Video Camera: Stefan Rose
Video Editing: David Arthur
Audio Recording: Ryan Clark
Lighting/Stage Technician: Kai Masaoka

Recorded August 2017 at the Ernest Balmer Studio at Tapestry Opera, Toronto for the Sound Travels Festival of Sound Art.

Special Thanks to the Canadian Electroacoustic Community and Canadian Music Centre.

The Sound Travels Festival of Sound Art in 2017 was supported in part by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Department of Canadian Heritage and the SOCAN Foundation.

“The Ghettoblaster Ensemble is a mobile sound unit designed to perform sound art wherever they find it necessary. TGE consists of 8 musicians and a conductor. The compositions are made especially for the ghetto blaster and for this constellation. This unique ensemble is a development of both the classical electroacoustic loudspeaker orchestra, and the idea of works for multi speaker setup .

This outdoor performance from the lawns outside St. Andrew-by-the-Lake Church on Toronto Island took place on August 8, 2004.

The program of works include “”Tonerain”” by Tobias Kirstein, “”Falling Drones”” by Jørgen Teller, “”How do you Like Your Noise ? vs. 2.2″” by Søren Raagaard and the world premiere of “”Balsteroid Convection”” by John Oswald, created especially for and performed by the Ghettoblaster Ensemble with funding from the Ontario Arts Council.

The video of this performance is part of a 20th anniversary video collection of performances and other events produced by New Adventures in Sound Art – https://www.naisa.ca/​

Direction – Darren Copeland.
Camera – Stefan Rose
Editing – David Arthur

The Sound Travels Festival of Sound Art in 2004 was supported in part by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, and The SOCAN Foundation.”

Jocelyn Robert performed this work at the Wychwood Theatre in May 2011 during the Deep Wireless Festival of Radio and Transmission Art.

“Philosophie Zoologique is a typical 21st century product : a bit of this and that, hard to decide, trying to do it all but unable to choose. It is the result of a human being’s attempt to be friends with the world and ending up waiting at one end of the line while at the other one a soft machine voice whispers press 9. I would hope it could be some sort of a melting pot homage to Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744-1829).” – Jocelyn Robert

Jocelyn Robert lives in Quebec City. He works in audio art, performance art, installation, video and writing. He published about fifteen solo cds, and participed in over twenty others. His visual arts work has been shown in Canada and around the world. He is the founder of the art centre Avatar, in Quebec City. He teaches at l’École des arts visuels et médiatiques de l’Université Laval, Quebec.”

The video of this performance is part of a 20th anniversary video collection of performances and other events produced by New Adventures in Sound Art – https://www.naisa.ca/ It is also included in the Deep Wireless 12 Online Album of Radio Art performances – https://soundcloud.com/naisa/jocelyn-robert-philosophie-zoologique?in=naisa/sets/deep-wireless-12″

The performance was recorded in May 2011 at Theatre Direct’s Wychwood Theatre in the Artscape Wychwood Barns, Toronto, Canada by Stefan Rose (video) and Hector Centeno (audio). The video was edited by David Arthur and directed by Darren Copeland.

The Deep Wireless Festival of Radio and Transmission Art in 2011 was supported in part by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, The Department of Canadian Heritage and The SOCAN Foundation.

“With the junctQín keyboard collective having explored the expansion of keyboard playing in the realm of electroacoustic music, Emilie Cecilia LeBel extended that interest in her composition by having the three keyboard players consider the role of their breath in their playing. In the context of this piece being performed in their ‘un-piano’ recital, which occured at the Sound Travels Festival of Sound Art in 2014, she adapted a Palestrina 5-part motet for 3 melodicas, 3 air mattress pumps, live electronics and 16-channel spatialization. The creation of this work was supported by the Ontario Arts Council, Music Commissioning program. In creating this work, LeBel was inspired by the book from which the piece takes its title.

“Mesmerized by the movement that repeats itself endlessly, I fix my gaze on the waves gently breaking against the dock. Fifty years seem compressed into this moment of sweet spring afternoon, and the notion of linear time seems artificial, invented to explain the passing of life. After all, the seasons are cyclical, and life is Now…” – from Kindness in the Ashes, Üstün B. Reinart”

The video of this performance is part of a 20th anniversary video collection of performances and other events produced by New Adventures in Sound Art – https://www.naisa.ca/​

“The performance was recorded August 15, 2014 at Theatre Direct’s Wychwood Theatre in Toronto, Canada by Stefan Rose. The video was edited by David Arthur and directed by Darren Copeland.

The Sound Travels Festival of Sound Art in 2014 was supported in part by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, The Department of Canadian Heritage and The SOCAN Foundation.”

“Lunar Cycle” is a set of three pieces by Stephanie Moore which each explore a different aspect of our relationship as humans to the moon. It features Adam Scime on double bass in two of its movements, and the third – a purely acousmatic movement – uses a substantial amount of sound material recorded from the double bass.

It was part of the Sound Travels Festival in August 2015 in Toronto. “Lunar Cycle” was part of a performance entitled “Revealing Origins” that also included a new work Wendalyn Bartley. Both pieces are included in this 20th anniversary video collection of performances and other events produced by New Adventures in Sound Art – https://www.naisa.ca/

The first movement of the cycle, Pleine lune for double bass and fixed media, explores the notion of transformation inspired by the full moon, and more specifically lycanthropy, or werewolfism. The bass is lead through a journey of metamorphosis by an altered version of itself (the fixed media part).

In the great green room there was a telephone and a red balloon, for double bass and fixed media, uses the text of the children’s story “Goodnight Moon” (by Margaret Wise Brown) to explore the psychological effect of nighttime, and the dual sense of security/insecurity that we first experience as children.

The final purely acousmatic movement of theLCROSS 2009-10-09 was inspired by the exploding of two rockets into the moon’s Cabeus crater by the U.S. government’s National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) on October 9, 2009. It highlights our modern scientific and political attitudes towards the moon, recounting the event and imagining a sonic equivalent to the strangely poetic visual descriptions of it (http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2010/oct/HQ_10-271_LCROSS_LRO.html).”

The Sound Travels Festival of Sound Art in 2015 was supported in part by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, The Department of Canadian Heritage and The SOCAN Foundation.

Composition and Spatialization Performance: Stephanie Moore
Artistic Direction: Darren Copeland
Video Camera: Stefan Rose
Video Editing: David Arthur
Audio Recording: Darren Copeland and Stephanie Moore
Lighting/Stage Technician: Kai Masaoka

Recorded August 22, 2015 at Theatre Direct’s Wychwood Studio, Toronto for the Sound Travels Festival of Sound Art.

Special Thanks to the Canadian Electroacoustic Community and Canadian Music Centre.

“Sound Can Fly” is a performance for sound can and sound man” created by theatre performance artist Neil Cadger (sound can) and audio artist Steve Heimbecker (sound man). Using specially created wearable sound equipment, the two artists created a dynamic exchange of sound “”in situ”” as they lead audiences from the Centre Island Ferry Dock to St. Andrew by-the-Lake Church.

The technology employed in “”Sound Can Fly”” was a hybrid combination: the soundcan itself was built from a portable, battery-powered amplifier, a coffee can, a car speaker and a dismantled back pack. Paired with this was Heimbecker’s whimsical “”Acoustic Field Intensifier (1994)””, a head device made from 18 metal funnels, also fitted with a portable, battery powered amplifier and speaker. Heimbecker’s composition for this performance was a specially mixed 2 channel composition generated from computer software and environmental sound sources played on mini-discs. The experience of immersive soundscape was created within the relationship between the 2 moving performers, and from the Doppler Effect created by the sound can, combining to produce a playful exploration of human behaviour in an age of extended senses.

Neil Cadger is a founding member of Wissel Theatre (a Belgian performance group) and teaches at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon. He has performed extensively in Europe for the past 20 years, most recently with Co. Mossoux-Bonté, a theatre/dance company based in Brussels.

Steve Heimbecker is a Saskatchewan native now living in Montreal. He studied fine arts at the Alberta College of Art and Design (Calgary, Canada). Though he hasn’t abandoned his interest in the visual or, more precisely, spatial dimension, he has focused his career mainly on sound, He is intrigued by sound’s sculptural effect and even defines himself as a sound sculptor. Recognized for his work in audio art and electroacoustic music, he is also recognized for his sonic sculptures and installations integrating sound components and devices of his on making. In 2005 his installation “”POD”” won an Honourable Mention in Interactive Media at the 2005 Prix Ars Electronica 2005 in Linz, Austria.”

The video of this performance is part of a 20th anniversary video collection of performances and other events produced by New Adventures in Sound Art – https://www.naisa.ca/​

“Direction – Darren Copeland.
Camera – Stefan Rose
Editing – David Arthur

The Sound Travels Festival of Sound Art in 2004 was supported in part by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, and The SOCAN Foundation.”

Performance/sound artist Kathy Kennedy led the audience gathered at the Pavillion on Centre Island to follow her sounds and enter into the “Singing Maze”, a sonic treasure hunt. The answers to questions lie in the trees and in the water. Birds give messages that only the most attentive listeners can decipher.

Kathy Kennedy is a sound artist with a background in classical singing. Her art practise generally involves the voice and issues of interface with technology, often using telephony or radio. She is also involved in community art, and is a founder of the digital media center for women in Canada, Studio XX, as well as the innovative choral group for women Choeur Maha. Her large scale sonic installation/performances for up to 100 singers and radio, called “”sonic choreographies,”” have been performed internationally including the inauguration of the Vancouver New Public Library and at the Lincoln Center’s Out of Doors Series. Her solo performances include a high level of improvisation over lush soundtracks of painstakingly mixed vocals and other sounds to create an immersive world of different voices.

The video of this performance is part of a 20th anniversary video collection of performances and other events produced by New Adventures in Sound Art – https://www.naisa.ca/​

Direction – Darren Copeland.
Camera – Stefan Rose
Editing – David Arthur

The Sound Travels Festival of Sound Art in 2003 was supported in part by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, and The SOCAN Foundation.

This August 12, 2023 episode of Making Waves features an interview with Kristine Diekman and Ben Pagac about the sound making and sound reception of insects along with recordings of their installation Secret Reception. Later in the show we play Creatures of the Ice by Eldad Tsabary from the Deep Wireless 5 double CD produced in 2008. The show ends with a short interview with Mitchell Akiyama and Brady Peters on their installation Sensation of Distribution, which uses resonant plumbing tubes to create confusion between what is building infrastructure and what is artistic creation.

Host Darren Copeland talks with Canadian interactive media artist Don Ritter for this October 14, 2023 episode of Making Waves. Don Ritter’s sound installation “O telephone” is currently being shown at the NAISA North Media Arts Centre in South River Canada. Ritter and Copeland discuss the use of sound in Ritter’s interactive media works since the 1990’s and how “O telephone” is a much different piece than his other works. The installation was originally made in 2007 for six telephones and eight speakers. The version at NAISA uses just one telephone along with the 8 speakers.