ENTER EXHIBITION
VISIT ARCHIVE
The ongoing project A Symphony Of Cities by Moroccan artist Abdellah M. Hassak is the result of his archival practices and sound exploration of urban environments.
With a background as an engineer of new technologies, the artist explores cities from the perspective of an acoustic architect. He analyses the patterns by archiving their signs and creating sound maps. The sounds – either recorded by the artist himself, sometimes with the help of collaborators based in other geographies, or else taken from digital platforms – are then subjected to a process of transformation. Through a software of the artist’s own conception, a computer processing model designed to transform sound phenomena into the MIDI language "Musical Instrument Digital Interfaces", the traces of the urban space become an orchestral composition. Hence, in A Symphony Of Cities the listener is invited to consider the result of this elaboration as a sound representation of the acoustic essence of a city. It is an invitation to reinterpret the sonic contribution of the urban environment and to reflect on the process that a city unconsciously undertakes every day in the creation of its own soundscape. The city 'builds' itself, composes and conducts a daily orchestra. The sound universe of a city is the custodian of multiple narratives and poetics.
A A Symphony Of Cities 2022 is a work based on recordings from the cities of Marrakech (where Abdellah M. Hassak lives), Gnesta (where he has recently been in virtual residency), Lima and Voronezh (the cities of the artists Milagros Bedoya and Tatiana Danilevskaya, with whom the artist was in dialogue as part of a project at Art Lab Gnesta). This project intends to solicit opportunities for meeting, leading to a critical reinterpretation of the urban identities and initiating a dialogue between the idea of real common space and geographical and narrative imagery.
BIO
Abdellah M. Hassak (1984, MA) is a sound artist, new media and music producer as well as art director. His research explores processes of participative sonic mapping at the urban level, integrating sound, daily technologies and radio as tools to foster agency in inhabitants' narrations of their environment. His work takes the form of performances and installations that include sound objects. This approach often involves transformative aspects of sound that are linked to concepts such as soundscape, resonance, frequency and noise, and new technologies. Abdellah has been collaborating with many institutions and cultural spaces in Morocco and abroad in radiophonic and sound practice, such as Esad Grenoble / Esav Marrakech / Mudawanat - Culture Resource / Qanat Collective / Dar Bellarj / Think Tanger / e-Joussour - Radio impact. He launched the Radio and Archive sound platform Mahattat Radio and develops a musical syncretic Afrofuturism music with field recordings practice as a Producer/DJ. He is co-founder of 4S', a Moroccan NGO which carries the FeMENA project, dedicated to the professionalization of women in the electronic music sector. His work has been presented in numerous group shows in different countries such as: 2012, D-CAF | Downtown Contemporary Arts Festival; 2014, Marrakech Biennale 5th Edition, Trading Urban Stories, Marrakesh; 2015, MASNAÂ - Le square d'en bas, Casablanca; 2015, Made in Friche Machine, festival d'arts numériques, Marseille; 2017, Radio Papesse - Süden Radio Symposium; 2017, Supercopy - Festival der / Samplingkultur | zeitraumexit; 2017, Port25, Raum für Gegenwartskunst, Mannheim; 2019, FFT Düsseldorf / 2019 - Grigri Pixel Madrid; 2019, HALLE 14 Forgotten Enlightenments, Leipzig; 2020, CTM Berlin - Festival for Adventurous Music and Art; 2020, Nakhla I Hammam. Steaming Stories, Bruxelles; 2020, Festival des Gestes de la Recherche; 2020, Pratiques d'hospitalité/Radio Papesse; 2021, Mudawanat – Culture Resource; 2022, Publication - Sound Practices in the Global South, Co-listening to Resounding Plurilogues, in conversation with Budhaditya Chattopadhyay.
With a background as an engineer of new technologies, the artist explores cities from the perspective of an acoustic architect. He analyses the patterns by archiving their signs and creating sound maps. The sounds – either recorded by the artist himself, sometimes with the help of collaborators based in other geographies, or else taken from digital platforms – are then subjected to a process of transformation. Through a software of the artist’s own conception, a computer processing model designed to transform sound phenomena into the MIDI language "Musical Instrument Digital Interfaces", the traces of the urban space become an orchestral composition. Hence, in A Symphony Of Cities the listener is invited to consider the result of this elaboration as a sound representation of the acoustic essence of a city. It is an invitation to reinterpret the sonic contribution of the urban environment and to reflect on the process that a city unconsciously undertakes every day in the creation of its own soundscape. The city 'builds' itself, composes and conducts a daily orchestra. The sound universe of a city is the custodian of multiple narratives and poetics.
A A Symphony Of Cities 2022 is a work based on recordings from the cities of Marrakech (where Abdellah M. Hassak lives), Gnesta (where he has recently been in virtual residency), Lima and Voronezh (the cities of the artists Milagros Bedoya and Tatiana Danilevskaya, with whom the artist was in dialogue as part of a project at Art Lab Gnesta). This project intends to solicit opportunities for meeting, leading to a critical reinterpretation of the urban identities and initiating a dialogue between the idea of real common space and geographical and narrative imagery.
BIO
Abdellah M. Hassak (1984, MA) is a sound artist, new media and music producer as well as art director. His research explores processes of participative sonic mapping at the urban level, integrating sound, daily technologies and radio as tools to foster agency in inhabitants' narrations of their environment. His work takes the form of performances and installations that include sound objects. This approach often involves transformative aspects of sound that are linked to concepts such as soundscape, resonance, frequency and noise, and new technologies. Abdellah has been collaborating with many institutions and cultural spaces in Morocco and abroad in radiophonic and sound practice, such as Esad Grenoble / Esav Marrakech / Mudawanat - Culture Resource / Qanat Collective / Dar Bellarj / Think Tanger / e-Joussour - Radio impact. He launched the Radio and Archive sound platform Mahattat Radio and develops a musical syncretic Afrofuturism music with field recordings practice as a Producer/DJ. He is co-founder of 4S', a Moroccan NGO which carries the FeMENA project, dedicated to the professionalization of women in the electronic music sector. His work has been presented in numerous group shows in different countries such as: 2012, D-CAF | Downtown Contemporary Arts Festival; 2014, Marrakech Biennale 5th Edition, Trading Urban Stories, Marrakesh; 2015, MASNAÂ - Le square d'en bas, Casablanca; 2015, Made in Friche Machine, festival d'arts numériques, Marseille; 2017, Radio Papesse - Süden Radio Symposium; 2017, Supercopy - Festival der / Samplingkultur | zeitraumexit; 2017, Port25, Raum für Gegenwartskunst, Mannheim; 2019, FFT Düsseldorf / 2019 - Grigri Pixel Madrid; 2019, HALLE 14 Forgotten Enlightenments, Leipzig; 2020, CTM Berlin - Festival for Adventurous Music and Art; 2020, Nakhla I Hammam. Steaming Stories, Bruxelles; 2020, Festival des Gestes de la Recherche; 2020, Pratiques d'hospitalité/Radio Papesse; 2021, Mudawanat – Culture Resource; 2022, Publication - Sound Practices in the Global South, Co-listening to Resounding Plurilogues, in conversation with Budhaditya Chattopadhyay.
28 May - 31 July 2022
OTO SOUND MUSEUM constitutes an archive of sound works. The recognition and conservation of works of intangible nature is one of the missions that characterized the museum since its foundation. The presentation of soundscapes in the museum marks their entry into the collection, conceived as archive for consultation available to anyone interested.
Symphony Of Cities, 2022
Abdellah M. Hassak (1984, MA)
Be free to listen as you wish
00:00 / 11m 48s, sound
Please tap on left sphere
to access the exhibition.
to access the exhibition.