The first year of studies was very complicated to finish. On a personal level, I was going through a lot of difficulties. I moved from Madrid to a city where I didn’t know anyone in the middle of a pandemic. Making friends anywhere took work, and interacting with my new classmates was hard. Although English was a language that I mastered at the time, it ended up not being my mother tongue. Going from high-school English to colloquial and sometimes academic English was complicated. However, in terms of execution, I found the first year too easy. In the second year of studies, the difficulty increased.
It started with a subject I was very interested in, which finally led me to investigate topics I was curious and passionate about. Remember that in the year before, my only academic essay was of commendable mockery – I wrote a little text about “chess music”. In the second year, I had the opportunity to write an essay about a subject I had an appreciation for and was curious to know more about. The peculiarity of that essay was its development method – an audio paper. The issue of the essay was Michel Giacometti and Portuguese ethnomusicology. This project led me to later develop my final course essay about the same topic, and with more research, in which I created a piece to talk about later.
As for the execution of the same audio paper, it was a very enriching experience. With this project, I finally gained pleasure in sound art because I could join a complex theme to the sound practice. In the end, I felt fulfilled. My tutor mentioned that my research was meritorious and equivalent to a PhD. Even my colleagues were amazed.
Another relevant project was the collaborative project with the MA VR students. By that time, I was able to have more consistent work in terms of sound for film, and, already in the spirit of a sound artist, I got back that pleasure of editing. With the collaborative project, I had very little joy. I was asked for a vaporwave song. First, I am not a musician; secondly, I did not master any knowledge about producing vaporwave songs. I had fun making the song, but I didn’t find it funny in the big picture of the course. This phase was very parodic.
The last and most relevant project of that year was undoubtedly the research project, where I joined a topic of great importance in the contemporary context of sound studies with sound art practice. It was a project where I took away a lot of information and was undoubtedly what made me fall in love with what I do. That same year I had the opportunity to visit, during vacations, numerous sound art venues such as festivals and events, and I even started to be more selective about my readings. I read many more essays and expanded my area of interest.
When I look at my learning experience over the past three years, there has been a reaffirmation of my goals as an artist. When I first started this course, I hoped to abandon my career as a film professional, as I felt at the time that this work robbed me of inspiration and artistic freedom. Later I came to realise that these skills would elevate my creative work.
I entered this course because I wanted to look for new ways of experimenting with sound without knowing much about how and where to start. During the first academic year, I invested my energy and wisdom in a project that had nothing to do with my previous practice because I found myself developing a piece of experimental music with voices and noises – something I had never done before. The result dazzled me because I didn’t know it would be very satisfying for some of my colleagues. This beginning of the course opened up my idea of the course and gave me a general insight into what sound art is all about.
The second project of the first academic year of equal relevance was the radio project. Although it was a project with a disastrous result, in my opinion, it was a project that made me realise something – “where not to fall”. I touched on clichéd themes and developed sounds that were somewhat, for me, embarrassing. There was, of course, some displeasure from some students, and there were others as, of course, it was to their liking, but that’s when I found myself falling off a cliff of ambiguity. I feared the same would happen again in the following projects and years.
In all the projects of that year, I failed miserably, but looking back, they were mistakes that helped me to evolve as an artist. Despite the success of my first project, the second one further accentuated the learning process, which was reflected during the rest of the course. In the last and third projects, I managed to achieve greater coherence. I explored a format I felt comfortable with and used techniques that also served as inspiration for future works. I remember receiving mixed feedback from my tutor. I remember not being pleased with one of his comments regarding my references for using a narrative voice – that I should have referenced x author or way of speaking when I thought it was something other than a relevant note.
Also, during that year, I finished my first experimental song. I don’t remember the name, but I remember it being a somewhat unpleasant project, given that I wasn’t clear about what “sound art” was.
This post will go through a compendium of festivals that concern the areas of film, sound for film, sound design, and sound art that I’ve collected throughout the years. Some of these festivals I have personally attended, and some others I look forward to going to and even participating in as an artist.
Berlin international sound design competition (BIFSC)
BIFSC is a competition that tries to emerge sound designers from different branches of audiovisual mediums (Film, TV, and Games). The main idea of this “festival” is for designers to be exposed to the industry and network with other designers. It also comes with awards. There’s also a category for Film Scoring.
How it works?
Participants don’t share their previous work. Instead, it is sent to participants a 5-minute award-winning short film which they would have to do sound design over. Later on, they will have one month to complete the task. Registration is 30€ (£26).
Awards
The awards are given after a selection of 10 finalists. The first three get to collaborate with the BIFSC Film Scoring competition winners, signifying a networking opportunity for them. Apart from that, winners will receive many other prizes, such as Sound Libraries, plugins and more. Link: www.bifsc.org/sound-design-competition
A’ Design awards
A’ Design Awards and Competition is for designers, innovators and companies that want to highlight themselves to attract the attention of media, publishers and buyers. It is free to sign-up for the A’ Design Award, it is free to upload your design and it is free, anonymous, confidential and obligation-free to obtain a preliminary score, before you nominate your work for the A’ Design Award consideration. This event has a sound design category called A’ Music, Audio and Sound Design Award, where participants.
How it works?
Participants have to submit their own work and these are selected according to aesthetical and emotional aspects of the audios.
Awards
Extensive and exclusive marketing and communication services to promote the success of winning the A’ Award. Furthermore, the winning designs appear on the A’ best designs book which is available worldwide, this book is furthermore distributed to the high-profile magazine editors, design oriented companies and relevant parties. The winning designs are also exhibited at our museum, and the best designs will be picked for the permanent exhibition. The winners appear on magazines, newspapers, webzines and many other publishing mediums.
Prix Ars Electronica
The Prix Ars Electronica is the world’s longest-running media art competition. The areas that are emphasized are electronic and interactive art, computer animation, digital culture, music and sound art. Many sound artists participated and won awards at this event that takes place in Linz, Austria – Chris Watson, Ryoji Ikeda, Francisco López, and many more.
How it works?
Awards
Sound Of the year awards
SOTY Awards or SOTYA is a competition that celebrates sound in all its forms and from all corners of the world. Their award is mainly set online, but last year they had a little ceremony in the British Library. Their juri comprised people from many different of the sound spectrum like sound and audio artists, audio producers, artist and ecologists, sound and installation artists, field recordists, mixing engineers, academics, and sound designers. SOTYA partner with Category partners this year include The British Library, Natural History Museum, Quiet Mark, Accidental, the Southbank Centre’s National Poetry Library, Sound On Sound, and UK Hearing Conservation Association.
How it works
The Categories are
Minute of Listening X SOTYA
Sound of the Year
A Disapearing Sound: A sound worth saving
Composed with Sound
Best Natural Sound
Best Imagined Sound
Best Innovation in Sound Technology
Most Unpleasent Sound
Best Sound Innovation in Everyday Life
Awards
the winner of each category will receive a pair of basicUcho microphones – a set of phantom-powered, high-quality omnidirectional electret microphones courtesy of LOM.
Other Competitive Festivals
ISFMF – The Internationl Sound and Film Music Festival (Pula, Croatia)
Sound and Music Film Festival Makedonska (Makedonska, Serbia)
SSFF – Short Sounds Film Festival (Bournemouth, England)
Norient Festival(Bern, Switzerland)
Music+Sound Awards (London, England)
Other Festivals and Events
Sound Art Brighton Festival
Sound Art Brighton is an independent initiative that celebrates the presence of sound art in Brighton, UK. Building on the wide interest this art form has attracted in the city, we promote the diversity of sound in its intrinsic relations with other arts and the everyday.
The festival is a city-wide programme of events presenting sound installations, sound sculptures, interactive sound events, performances, sound walks, audio and audiovisual works, both in galleries and outdoors, throughout the city of Brighton and Hove (UK).
The festival also provides SAB Network – an informal collaborative network.
Fest – New Directors | New Films Festival
FEST in Espinho, Portugal, is a new generation of festivals, featuring film screenings, music concerts & showcases, Conference sessions, projects in development, competitions, TV showcases, Awards ceremonies, and much more. From all the film festivals I have attended, FEST is the best festival for networking. There’s a Film competition alternatively, but the main emphasis are the masterclass given by film professionals. Previous lecturers were Gaspar Noé, Bella Tarr, Asghar Farhadi, Peter Webber and many more. The perk of this festival is the Sound & Music Hub:
The Sound & Music Hub at the FEST Film Festival is a program dedicated to exploring the intersection of sound and music in film. It offers a platform for filmmakers, composers, sound designers, and music supervisors to discuss their work, exchange ideas, and showcase their latest projects. People that attended: Will Files, Mark Ulano, John Warhurst, Salome Limon.
Lisboa Soa
Lisboa Soa is a festival dedicated to the exploration of sound, taking place annually in Lisbon, Portugal. The festival features various sound art installations, performances, workshops, and talks, all focused on the use of sound in artistic expression and as a medium for experiencing the world. The festival aims to promote and celebrate sound art, to create a platform for artists to showcase their work, and to engage audiences in new and innovative ways of experiencing sound. Lisboa Soa also aims to raise awareness of the importance of sound and its impact on our daily lives, as well as to foster a community of artists, scholars, and enthusiasts interested in the field of sound art.
The festival is developed by one of my favourite sound personalities – Raquel Castro. She is a Portuguese sound artist and researcher who has been involved in the organization and production of the festival since its inception in 2014. She is a member of the cultural association Binaural/Nodar, which produces the festival, and has played a key role in curating and organizing its programming. In addition to her work on Lisboa Soa, Raquel Castro is also involved in various other projects related to sound art and media culture, including research, creation, and dissemination activities. She has a background in music and sound design and has collaborated with artists from various disciplines, such as dance, theater, and visual arts, to create immersive and experimental soundscapes.
Other Festivals
IN-SONORA (Sound Art Festival in Madrid, Spain).
SONICA (biennial Sound Art Festival in Glasgow, Edinburgh).
Full of Noises Festival (aka FonFestival is a new music and sound art festival in Cumbria, England).
SÓNAR (festival dedicated to music, creativity and technology in Lisbon and Barcelona).
Semibreve (exploratory electronic music and digital art festival in Braga, Portugal).
To complete my CV, I had one last task to complete – adding my website. I had never done a website, so it was unclear where to start. This post will go through its process.
Research
Firstly, I had to understand how to aim for the website. I felt that broadening its contents o much would make the website navigation difficult. The content has to be as straightforward as possible. Sometimes when an artist calls themselves multidisciplinary, it could get confusing because it doesn’t specify what they do, apart from being multi. Many artists do this, but it is complicated to understand for me. It reminds me of how people used to be named many centuries ago (and still in some towns – in this town in Portugal, people are called by their features, so later, between them, they know whom someone is talking about)
Manuel Caterreira’s village name is Alfredo dos Plásticos (Alfred of the Plastics) because he works with plastics.
I did the same exercise. What do I want to be known for? Raul, the Sound Designer. So, I shall focus my website on that.
My inspiration for my website focused on three other creative websites.
This is one of my favourite websites that I found. It is very interactive, and it is all about sound. Chiara designed UI sound when moving the cursor through the website with Foley sounds. Also, the layout is very appealing and resonates a lot with the type of website I am looking for.
Jeff Moberg’s website is less interactive and more straightforward than Chiara’s. What makes Jeff’s website unique is its simplicity and straightforwardness. The main feature I enjoy the most about his website is the large-scale videos that are aesthetically appealing. One of the videos turns out to be his showreel. What I didn’t like was the style it was made out. I want my website to showcase a little bit of who I am, and I don’t identify with this very techy and straightforward design.
What I like about this website is the way the projects are showcased. What I don’t like is the way the text is designed. I think there’s too much text. If I had the resources to build a Website, I would go for one similar to Chiara’s. It was very inspiring, and I definitely sell the best Chiara.
This website took about 3 days to design in Wix. It is very much inspired by the personality of Chiara’s website, with a mixture of the other two. The website has 5 pages:
Home
Here I decided to copy a bit of Jeff’s layout. I don’t have a showreel for now, so I used one of my art pieces, Falsa Memoria. It is set as an automatic player with no sound, but it draws the user’s attention to my other artistic side. Also, I like the fact that the home page is text free.
Sound Design
This page is a WOP because I intend to build a subpage for each project. Here is all my filmography in sound design and music composition should go. I decided to lay it out by showcasing big-sized still pictures of the films I’ve worked on. I had to ask the respective directors for those files and other info, that being why the subpages are not yet created. There is so much work ahead of me to finish that page. For now, it will look like this.
Artwork
Here is supposed to go all the art pieces I’ve done so far with subpages that try to explain a bit of them without falling on Andrea Colosio’s mistake of drowning it with text. I also added the respective multimedia for each work (SoundCloud and Vimeo). I intend to update the page by adding my Major Projects.
About
One of the things I don’t like about this page is my picture. I lack good pictures of myself as an artist, and those that could be used are not good enough. A photoshoot is something that I look forward to doing in the future. Here goes my artist statement, a picture of choice and a link to my CV.
Contact
Here go my contacts and way of contacting you directly through the website. It has a form that the user can fill out and send a message to me. I also have my Portuguese and Uk number and a link to my professional Instagram account.
What is next
I need to take more pictures of myself.
I need to create an excellent showreel to put on the homepage.
I recently finished the first draft of my new CV, which tries to follow the resources provided by the module, such as the Career Tool Kit.
Firstly, I will present my previous CV, written the last year.
For both CVs, I used Canva because it helped me accomplish page organisation and aesthetics better. It also makes the reading more pleasing, in my opinion. This CV isn’t bad, but it has some things that were pointed out by the tutor as wrong:
Photographs are usually not seen in a standard format, only in the US.
Jobs should be presented as the latest first and the oldest last.
The skills could be summarised better
The statement could sound a little bit vague.
My job experience is not organised in the standard Film Industry resume.
No UK phone number
The Draft CV
Notes:
There’s no longer a picture of myself. It Neutralises much more the CV.
Changed my name to my artist name.
Now I have a UK number, and the address is updated.
My Artist Statement was drafted several times, this one being the best I’ve done so far. It is more direct to the the roles I’m looking for. It expresses interest in the area.
The SKILLS still need to be updated, but I feel this template didn’t allow me to develop much more.
My Tech skills are briefer but also updated.
My education is in chronological order, but it emphasises now what relevant work I did in each course – this way, I can fit in more experience.
My experience is briefer but now is under the standards of the Film Industry.
What’s next?
Use the CV360 tool to check whether the CV is good or not
Attend a Tutorial with the Careers team to check on my CV.
In this exercise, I was supposed to research different types of opportunities relevant to my professional career. I should provide three examples for each class.
Postgraduate Study
The possible scenarios in my career can be divided into three options: Sound Design/ Audio Production, Music, Sound Art, or something not related to those mentioned.
MA in Audio Production (Full Time/ Part Time) at Westminster Universityhttps://www.westminster.ac.uk/music-courses/2023-24/september/full-time/audio-production-ma
MA in Sound Studies and Sonic Arts at Universität der Künste Berlin https://www.udk-berlin.de/en/courses/sound-studies-and-sonic-arts-master-of-arts/
MA’s in Goldsmiths University: Computational Arts, Filmmaking (Sound Recording, Post-Production, and Design), Music, MMus Music, MMus Creative Practice, MMus Sonic Arts.
MA’s in UAL-LCC: MA in Music Production, MA in Sound Arts
MA’s in UAL-CSM: MA in Art and Science
There’s also room to study music non-academically, either by myself or through short courses.
Funders, sponsors, prizes
The Lumen Prize https://www.lumenprize.com (3D/Interactive Award: $1,000(for work that engages with audiences through sound, touch or movement)
New Emergence Art Prize https://www.newemergenceart.com (The annual New Emergence Art Prize offers a £1000 cash prize and a permanent feature in our online gallery. We want to help underrepresented artists to gain exposure and provide financial support.).
I’ve created a professional Instagram for the past year to enhance my freelance work as a sound designer. However, that decision was made without exploring the best ways of making a professional Instagram. In this post, I will go through an article provided by UAL called Marketing and promoting yourselfonline, and most specifically, the chapter on Social Media. I will also try to update and integrate my social media pages into my website.
Choose relevant social media platforms.
The article recommends selective choosing of the platforms used. Instagram is meant for visual practice, LinkedIn is for networking, and Pinterest to boost online shopping. I don’t need a Pinterest, but I do need the other two.
This video suggests that “LinkedIN” for film industry professionals is IMDdPro.
Personal vs professional
Balancing work with personal life is suitable for both worlds. Either your friends won’t feel you’re spamming them with your work, or your employers will see your social life mixed with your portfolio.
Scheduling Content
The problem that I have the most is inconsistent content upload. Keeping social media updated is a complicated task. As for now, I haven’t updated my Instagram since July 2022. Same for Linkedin – I don’t know how to share or update that platform. The article recommends the following scheduler apps to help out in these situations:
1) B U F F E R
Buffer is an app designed to manage social media ( Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Instagram Stories, Pinterest, and LinkedIn) and analyse community engagement results. Buffer.com is actually divided into three separate groups of features: Publishing (schedule social media posts), Analytics (posts performance reports), and Engagement (focused on more prominent organisations to manage direct conversations with clients).
2) L A T E R
Upload and collect media in the Media Library
Schedule and publish media posts for Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, TikTok, and LinkedIn
Analyse post performance
Drive traffic from your Instagram bio to your sites using Linkin. bio
3) H O O T S U I T E
The first social media management platform aims at social marketing (Creating, scheduling, publishing, and managing content), Social commerce (AI-led direct Engagement with clients), and Social customer care.
Content creation
The article also suggests that creators should block out time daily to dedicate to their social media by blocking 20 minutes daily.
Research of sound designers’ social media
Tim Harrison
Tim Harrisson’s Instagram works almost as a monthly diary of his work but is consistent. The posts focus on Tim’s jobs rather than what he is doing. There’s no WOP or videos of himself working as if it was his portfolio. There’s no organisation of contents. But each post has excellent descriptions, and the images and videos that he picks are somehow very representative of his work.
Frederica Viera Campos
Frederica Ferreira Campos is a Portuguese artist from Porto that studied at RCA, and I came across her work after seeing her name at Coliseu do Porto concert. She is a multidisciplinary artist (harpist, sound artist, dancer, performer, educator), and on her Instagram, she shares a panoply of content from all the areas she practices. This is one of the things I fear from being multidisciplinary – the overwhelming content of many things. As we can see from Francisca’s Instagram, there’s an inclination towards dancing. Here and there, there’s a post dedicated to her harpist self and some others dedicated to her sound artist “persona”. I don’t think it is wrong. I only think it is confusing. However, regarding her consistency, Francisca publishes quite constantly. Her latest post was made a day ago, and the one before a week ago. I like her Instagram because it is a diary and transmits much of her personality. Her post descriptions are brief and objective but very personal and intimate.
SAM AUINGER
Sam Auinger is a sound artist (composer and thinker), and what I like about his Instagram is how true it looks. The material he posts is very gallery-like. All his posts are worthy of a digital exhibition of his work; one can be hooked by scrolling down his material. There’s little to no interaction with his community, however. No BTS, No WOPs.
Pedro Tudela
Pedro Tudela is a sound and visual artist from Portugal, based in Porto. His Instagram works contrary to Sam Auinger’s. His material resembles the BTS and his thinking process to achieve his art pieces, or who were the people involved or the people he works with. Pedro also shows his learnings through gatherings or collaborations with other artists, lectures, books, etc. I would very much like to have an Instagram like his.
Simon Hayes
Simon Hayes is an academy award winner and works as a production sound mixer. He is also a very beloved personality among film professionals, especially in the sound department. I like the type of posts he has. It reminds me of Tudela’s Instagram, but because Hayes is not an artist, he shares his experience in the film set and the gear he uses. His post descriptions are very informative, which can explain why he is beloved in the sound department – his posts are beneficial for some. You can also see that he engages a lot with the working scenario that he is in – taking pictures with actors and other professionals and even posting reflective material of his opinions about the industry and so on.
Sofia Matrosova
Sofia Matrosova is a sound designer and artist. Sofia’s approach to her Instagram is very similar to Tudela’s, Harrison’s and Hayes’ Instagram because she presents her BTS, shows her work in a portfolio way, and tries to engage with other communities by writing exciting descriptions and asking her followers about their opinions.
My Instagram
A to-do list to improve my Instagram
Create a schedule of posts through one of the apps suggested
Create a link tree
Find a formula for centres that work in the long term.
This article has a table that deconstructs different competencies and their respective challenges, strategies, implications, and CPD (Continual Professional Development). In this post, I will analyse table number 6 on this article provided by my tutor Dawn Scarffe. I will try to take notes and contextualise them in my practice for some of the things mentioned in the graph.
Knowing the industry opportunities, threats and requirements.
Understanding the industry has been a process of five years, and It changes depending on the country I am in. Also, each nation brings its own challenges. For instance, I researched a bit about the artists’ situation in Portugal, and it is conflicting to see that most artists are not covered by the state, and in some cases, they are not seen as workers (?). Only 0,25 of the government’s annual budget is dedicated to Culture. Portugal is one of the poorest countries in Europe, so it makes sense that the priorities aren’t related to Culture. This could entail a threat. It’s essential to know one’s everyone before starting to use it in their favour. As an artist and future culture-related worker, I face the sad reality of being unable to work in my country, as I already came across many job opportunities here in London. The industry I’m mainly looking for is the film industry, and I could also consider the radio and podcastindustry. One of my biggest challenges would be the adaptation to new work environments. So far, I’ve only worked as a freelancer, which is already very challenging. Still, I have never had the chance to participate in context with other professionals and bigger-scale clients. One of the CPDs I found most interesting for this competence was joining (or setting up) a studio group – it seems a bit too romantic. The most urgent CPD is undoubtedly Access to Business & Financial Advice.
1 – Manage career demands: to keep passion without burning out. It is often sad that we as workers have to conform to becoming used to burnout and keep passion without suffering from a syndrome conceptualised as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed sounds counterproductive. According to an article from Eastern Washington University, there are many forms of burnout (physical, emotional, and behavioural) and stages (Milder Symptoms, Longer lasting symptoms, and Severe symptoms). It sounds counterproductive because, even though London might be one the best places in Europe to enhance one’s career, it might also be one of the most challenging places to do that sustainably.
2- Manage career demands:balance career and family. As a foreigner in the UK, balancing academic work, freelance work, romantic relationships, and family have been very complicated. In fact, If a student like myself, who lacks sustainable funds to properly move around the city and stay in touch with their happenings and whatnot, it will likely have to unbalance the amount of time dedicated to one of those ties.
STRATEGIES
1 – Knowing your values andgoals: Commit to your craft
2 – Pursue of passion: One thing that pops up in my mind thinking about this is burnout or finding new interests. When employed in a job unrelated to my craft, one can shift from one interest to another.
Implications
1 – Suited best for those whose primary value is their career or whose primary value is ‘to be an artist“:
The financial crash in 2008, followed by years of
austerity, has meant that, once again, creative
careers have increasingly become the preserve of
the elite. This has had a devastating effect on the
arts, excluding those without the resources to sustain
themselves in a cut-throat career. If we want an
inclusive art world that speaks to the experiences of
everyone in society, then artists must come from all
Angus started the lecture by showing an image of an exotic beach, followed by a field recording of waves.
The Beginning – The Zines.
Angus started by designing zines – one was about a definition of house music. After those 10 years, Angus incorporated a writing methodology based on writing constraints. He wants to get away from the banality of his own writing. Themepark was a way of thinking about several different approaches according to other things. In Felt the Moonlighton my Feet, Angus goes by writing with encompassed morse code implemented in the punctuation.
Field Notes
Field Notes are part of Angus’ process of field recording. They’re usually compiled in black notebooks or on his phone. He writes about bringing together observations of different kinds of ideas in the future. Another type of note recording is tracking your paths – documenting your presence.Time stamping is very important. In a project called Zawawa, Angus was asked to record his presence live. Even file management could be a way of field notes, Angus says.
In a project from 2018, Angus started reading his notes on his field recordings. He says that he didn’t work. A download index, Night Blooms, is a book that describes the period when Angus recorded his own voice. Cave Mouth and Giant Voice (2015) with Rupert Cox was a work that represents the testimony of a survivor of a battle in Japan – a film with subtitles, with no voice, and field recordings of the cave where the subject hid.
With Chiara Caterina, Angus experimented with a different form of note-taking – On the website, as one scroll downward, one can see the written notes, documented photographs of the site and audio documentation (Website – 2016). In Il, Vertice notes were incorporated in score notation. The words of the field notes became allocated by software.
Field Notes Against Sonic Exceptionalism
Field notes (as text and as sound) as un Cinematic, unMusical; Field notes as awkward, partial, mistaken, oblique; Field Notes as remainder/reminder of cortisol listening; Field notes (with constraints?) as “no input” field recording; Field notes outside the field, outside the sugar cane, the surf. Cortisol Listeningis a phenomenon that happens alongside note-taking – when one realises the importance of place and sonic awareness, one feels a sense of realisation.
Field Recordings as Field Notes and Field Notes as Field Recordings
In this introductory class, we comprehended what we are most interested in and contextualised that among a perspective of professional futures. These “futures” are academic, professional, and creative.
The tutor Dawn Scarfe started by asking simple questions – What’s your name?; What do you do?: I answered that I’m professionalised to do sound for film, but I broadly engage with other areas of sound design. For instance, I do sound design for audiovisuals, sound documentaries and found object performances. One of the questions I later came up with was – How can I promote myself if I have many artistic profiles? In the case of film, having your official name as your credited name was standardised. However, my artist’s name is Raul Tabu. In the tutor’s view, it would be best to have different profiles—Raul A. Ramos as a sound for film designer and Raul Tabu as a multidisciplinary sound artist.
Exercise 1 – Introductions
Name
What is the medium (form, material)?
Where do you share it? (gallery, label, theatre)
Three keywords (what does it do or feel like?)
Profile 1
Raul A. Ramos
Film director, sound designer
Film Festivals, Youtube
synchretic, acousmatic, verosimil
Profile 2
Raul Tabu
Multidisciplinary Sound Artist, Audio Director
Soundcloud, Bandcamp, Youtube, Instagram
Sensory, Sight-specific, Socially-engaged
Exercise 2 – Wider Contexts
Describe as briefly as possible (ideally, one sentence for each question).
Why do I make art? What are my interests?
A.: For me, making art is a way of expressing my experience in the world. With an artistic perspective, I deconstruct life and share those interpretations with others. I become closer to the core of complex things by exploring audible and oral histories, sound design, and field recording.
Why do I work with my particular medium or material?
A.: I started working on sound for film when I was 18, and it shifted to broaden the sound design capabilities and qualities onto different mediums. Every sound transmits emotional impressions, and I want to bring awareness of that and integrate it into a spectrum of rhetorical and fictionised storytelling and understanding of social and natural spaces and environments.
Is my work influenced or inspired by anything/anyone?
A.: Lucrecia Martel, Lionel Marchetti, Toshyia Tsunoda, Sofia Saldanha, Félix Blume, Dziga Vertov, Pierre Schaeffer.
Why is my work different to the artists?
Lucrecia Martel: She is an Argentinian film director, and her way of telling stories has sound on the pedestal. Articles have shown that her style is entirely focused on the textural characteristics of voice and acousmatic sounds that give the moving image a powerful connotation. As an audio director, I remove the image but rely on Lucrecia’s teachings of textures.
Lionel Marchetti: He is a french musique concrète composer that uses many sonic sources (experimental analogue devices with various microphones, feedback, radio waves, magnetic tape recorder, modified speakers, and analogue synthesisers), and his approach is merely aesthetical. One of my all-time favourite pieces is Portrait d’un glacier (Alpes – 2173 m) / 1998 ~ composition de musique concrète, where Marchetti uses field recordings of an expedition to Mare du Glace and combines them as a composition. I try to bring storytelling to my designs compared to Marchetti’s approach. Marchetti’s abstract and aesthetical work also doesn’t seem as accessible as my approach.
Toshyia Tsunoda: Tsunoda is a Japanese artist who works as a sound source with inert matter. His field recordings are enjoyable to the hearing. Field recordings are part of my method of working.
What is the most critical thing I want to explore/communicate through my work?
I want to tell stories through sound, field recordings, through experimental sound practices.
Exercise 3 – Draft Your statement
2-3 sentences outlining your approach. Include the following elements when describing your work: What is it? Where is it? What does it do? How? Why?
Raul Tabu is a sound artist and designer interested in the capabilities of sound as a storytelling agent and a way of expanding its sensorial experience. Raul works between sound for film, sound for video art, musique concrete, found object performances, audio documentaries, and field recording. He has worked in films such as Entre las Rocas (2022; short film; Spanish production) by Jesús F. Cruz, Ménades (2023; feature film; Spanish production) by Gabriela Alonso Martínez, and The River Woman (2023; short film; British and Portuguese co-production) and also solo projects such as Falsa Memoria (2021), No muevas, Escucha (2022), Porta Metálica (2022). In his projects, Raul invites the listener to connect the audition to other senses and its aural materiality among audiovisual arts or audio.
Optional: find an image or graphic that could be displayed alongside your statement.
This is something I still have to work on. I will try to find photographers and friends that could help with this.
