The Space between Voice and Gesture

In "The Space Between Voice and Gesture" workshop participants will work on extended vocal techniques, sound, listening, graphic scores and performance, fostering new creative perspectives through interdisciplinary methods.

This is a workshop that engages participants in exploring the intersections between oral and written phenomena in sound, and in experimenting with new interdisciplinary methodologies in vocal performance art. Operating at the intersection of sound, body and visual art, the workshop will focus on the potential of sound to be extended and transformed through the compositional practices of voice, gesture, field recording and drawing. The voice is ephemeral: how can we make the presence of our voice visible? Every vocal expression involves not only the vocal chords and the uvula, but the whole gesticulating body - unique in its individuality and totality.
The voice is our body and our memory; it is the original instrument that can be expanded, transformed or symbolised. The voice can be recorded, making it eternal. When the voice becomes a gesture, it can also emerge as a drawing or a graphic score. What are the relationships and tensions between these different media? The concept of utopia runs through the workshop as an invitation to imagine new creative perspectives, to address issues of otherness and to reflect on personal and collective sonic memory.

Schedule

The workshop runs daily from 10am to 5pm, with a lunch break. It will unfold through moments of practical exploration in large and small groups, as well as through collective discussion. Over the course of four days, participants will:

• Observe the breath and deepen their listening skills and awareness of the voice and the environment
• Explore the voice as bodily expression
• Develop extended vocal techniques, including noise, distortion, and alienation of the voice, as well as invented languages
• Work on visualising the voice through the creation of abstract drawings
• Create graphic scores and a repertoire of gestures
• Record voices and environmental sounds, both indoors in the workshop space and outdoors through sound walks
• Analyse the graphic material and recordings produced during the workshop
• Experiment with new interdisciplinary methods of vocal performance art, using both improvisation and composition techniques
On the final day, participants will present a group performance to a wider audience.

Knowledge requirements
The workshop is open to anyone with a strong interest and experience in voice, sound art, music, performing arts, visual arts and text. It is not necessary to be a professional singer to participate in the workshop.

Equipment requirements
Participants are encouraged to bring various sizes of paper, pencils, a sketchbook and audio recording devices (e.g. digital recorder, tape recorder, smartphone, etc.). Some equipment will be provided by the University.

Alessandra Eramo is a sound artist, vocalist, performer andcomposer based in Berlin. Her artistic practice spans performance, installation, sound poetry, video, and drawing, exploring the latent acoustic territories of the voice and noise as a socio-political matter. Through live performances and interdisciplinary artistic projects, she investigates themes related to the body, memory, migration, and identity, often employing participatory actions and experimental approaches to composition. Trained in classical singing, piano, and music theory, she studied at the Academy of Fine Arts Brera in Milan and in Stuttgart, earning Master's degree in Performance Studies from Ca' Foscari University in Venice. Alessandra Eramo has exhibited and performed at prestigious festivals, museums, art spaces and institutions, including the Wuhan Art Biennale (2024-2025), the MaerzMusik Festival Berlin(2024), the Lisboa Soa Festival (2023), Heroines of Sound Festival Berlin (2022), the Italian Culture Institute Brussels/Kira A.
Princess of Prussia Foundation (2021). In 2023, she was awarded the Work Fellowship for New Music and Sound Art by the Berlin Senate. Co-founder of Corvo Records - vinyl & sound art production -, she is actively involved in the artistic community of Berlin as a member of Errant Sound and serves as a lecturer in the Master in Sound Studies and Sonic Arts at the University
of the Arts Berlin.
www.ezramo.com