Sounding Conflict
Sounding Conflict
FREE EVENT
Exhibition / performance and film
Performance times: 2.00 pm on 20 May 2023 in the Theatre, Braid Arts Centre.
Seating limited, booking advised.
Film will show during the Sound and Wellness Festival on 20 May 2023 in the Studio Theatre, Braid Arts Centre.
Sounding Conflict: A Performance in Five Acts
The Sounding Conflict installation created by Pedro Rebelo with Matilde Meireles is focused on a 30 minute performance film directed by Patrick J O’Reilly with performers Joe Loane and Keith Singleton. The work aims to bring together various strands of field work from the Sounding Conflict project across regions such as the Middle East, Northern Ireland and Brazil.
The film element of the installation depicts two young men incessantly cycling through state of destruction and rebuilding, a house, a wall, a city… Structured over five acts and a coda, the filmed performance reflects acts of resistance, reconciliation and resilience as the two men struggle to control a world made of bricks in an ever hopeful set of actions.
The ability for sound to create space and materialise action is explored through the creation of a sonic world which constantly shifts between the concreteness of building and destruction, to surrounding soundscapes and references to Syrian, Brazilian and Northern Irish Hip Hop. The global conventions of Hip Hop combined with its very notable regional variations presents a sonic palette to question the role of music created under conflict situations.
How this piece fits with the Sound and Wellness Festival theme ‘Sound, Space, Connect’:
Sounding Conflict: A Performance in Five Acts is a film and live performance addressing how communities at different stages of conflict connect to sound and space.
Sound plays a critical role in place-making and conflict situations highlight how critical listening and sound making shapes everyday life.
The work draws from field work from across the Middle East, Northern Ireland and Brazil. Connections from across these regions around themes of resistance, resilience and reconciliation are played out through performative action and sound environments. The work is framed by quotes from project participants reflecting on their experience of sound and conflict.
The work was created by Pedro Rebelo with Matilde Meireles and Tinderbox Theatre Company.
Live performance by Luna Kalo and Aisling McCormick
Sounding Conflict: A Performance in Five Acts
Concept and Sound Design: Pedro Rebelo with Matilde Meireles
Performance (film): Patrick J O’Reilly – Director, Joe Loane and Keith Singleton – Performers
Technical assistance: Aisling McGeown, Johnny McGuiness and Craig Jackson
Live Performance: Luna Kalo, Aisling McCormick
Produced at SARC, Queen’s University Belfast
Duration: 30 minutes
2021
Created as part of the AHRC/ESRC research project ‘Sounding Conflict’
https://www.qub.ac.uk/research-centres/SoundingConflict/
Pedro Rebelo is a composer, sound artist and researcher. In 2002, he was awarded a PhD by the University of Edinburgh where he conducted research in music and architecture. Pedro has led participatory projects involving communities in Belfast, favelas in Maré, Rio de Janeiro, travelling communities in Portugal and a slum town in Mozambique. This work has resulted in sound art exhibitions at venues such as the Metropolitan Arts Centre, Belfast, Centro Cultural Português Maputo, Espaço Ecco in Brasilia and Parque Lage and Museu da Maré in Rio, Museu Nacional Grão Vasco, Golden Thread Gallery, Whitworth Gallery Manchester, Convento de São Francisco Coimbra and MAC Nitéroi. His music has been presented in venues such as the Melbourne Recital Hall, National Concert Hall Dublin, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Ars Electronica, Casa da Música, and in events such as Weimarer Frühjahrstage fur zeitgenössische Musik, Wien Modern Festival, Cynetart and Música Viva. He has collaborated with musicians such as Chris Brown, Mark Applebaum, Carlos Zingaro, Evan Parker and Pauline Oliveros as well as artists such as Suzanne Lacy.
Pedro has been Visiting Professor at Stanford University, senior visiting professor at UFRJ, Brazil and Collaborating Researcher at INEM-md Universidade Nova, Lisboa. He has been Music Chair for international conferences such as ICMC 2008, SMC 2009, ISMIR 2012 and has been invited keynote speaker at ANPPOM 2017, ISEA 2017, CCMMR 2016, EMS 2013 and EIMAD 2022. He has recently been awarded two major grants from the Arts and Humanities Research Council including the interdisciplinary project “Sounding Conflict”, investigating relationships between sound, music and conflict situations. Ongoing research interests include immersive sound design and augmented listening experiences. Pedro has been appointed Director of SARC: Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Sound and Music in 2021 and is a fellow of the Senator George J. Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security and Justice.
Matilde Meireles is a sound artist and researcher. Her work has a multi-sensorial and multi-perspective critical approach to site, where Matilde investigates the potential of listening across spectrums as ways to encounter and articulate a plural experience of the world — human and otherwise. These range from the inner architectures of reeds and complex water ecologies, to the local neighbourhood, the life of vegetables, and the architecture of radio signals. She often highlights collaboration and participation as catalysts for a shared understanding of place, developing project-based or long-term collaborations. Her work is regularly presented at national and international level, in the form of concerts, installations, releases, community projects, and academic publications.
She holds a PhD in Sonic Arts from the Sonic Arts Research Centre, Queen’s University Belfast, and is currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at University of Oxford in the project Sonorous Cities: Towards a Sonic Urbanism (SONCITIES).
About the Sounding Conflict performers:
Luna Kalo is an award-winning theatre, film and T.V. actress known for performing complex strong, unique female leads. She has worked professionally as a versatile, multilingual performer (English, French, Italian, & Spanish) in the creative sector in Northern Ireland and abroad.
She has a solid foundation in European theatre schools, thanks to several merit based scholarships: Lecoq in Paris, Estudis de Teatre in Barcelona, and Antonio Fava’s Commedia dell’Arte School of Performing Arts in Reggio Emilia, Italy. She won an Individual Artist’s award award to attend the Ivana Chubbuck studio in Los Angeles, California.
She toured professionally in theatres throughout France, Spain, Italy, Northern Ireland, R.O.I. Scotland, Portugal and the Netherlands. Notable film credits on IMDB include: HBO “Game of Thrones,” Maeve Kincade in “Her Very Own” (Belfast and Cork film festivals) Annie Walsh in “Racht” for Paper Owl Films, TG4 and the title role in “Banshee,” an independent, experimental horror film.
She played the lead in the critically acclaimed one-woman show “East Belfast Granny” (2018) by the award-winning writer and director of Partisan Productions, Fintan Brady.
Aisling McCormick (she/her) is a multi-disciplinary multi-genre creative from Dublin, based in Belfast. Her work as an independent artist spans choreography, voice, theatre, choral direction, arts participation and wellbeing, with a particular interest in connection to nature.
She holds an MA in Dance (UL) and is currently undertaking PhD research exploring dance and maternal health at Queen’s University Belfast. Her choreography has been performed in Samuel Beckett Theatre, Project Arts Centre, Smock Alley Theatre and Accidental Theatre. An experienced choral singer and choral director, Aisling regularly performs with HIVE Improvised Choir, Tonnta Ensemble and as a freelance singer.
In her spare time she grows artisanal cut flowers with Sow Grateful Flower Farm and leads regular workshops in horticulture, floristry and wellbeing!
@aislinganseo