We are delighted to confirm a live performance featuring participants who are taking part in Useful Tools – an electronic sound project with artist Hannah Sawtell. Through April and June, Hannah has been working with Old Bort, Laura Fox, Khush Kali, Indira Lakshmi, Sam Owen, Heather Reid, Davinia-Ann Robinson, Natalie Roe, Emily Scarrott & Emily Warner to collaborate and build together a sonic performance.
Hannah Sawtell, Useful Tools, #usefultools_moz
Hosted on both floors at Centrala on the 23 June from 7-9pm the performance brings together work created through the group using a web-based sound programme coded in partnership between Sawtell and interdisciplinary artist and researcher Lizzie Wilson. The event is free to attend and is hosted by our Minerva Works neighbours, Centrala.
Pre booking is encouraged here.
The event will be live streamed for those who want to join us from home.
USEFUL TOOLS Performance 23 June 2023
7–9pm at Centrala
Unit 4, Minerva Works, 158 Fazeley Street,
Birmingham B5 5RT
Building on Sawtell’s interests in technology & access, Useful Tools provides an opportunity for women from a wide range of creative backgrounds to explore sound and performance. Paid bursaries have been provided to support time and access to the programme and participants were recruited through an open call in Spring of 2023.
Beyond the performance in Birmingham, Useful Tools will exist as a free to use, web based sound programme coded in partnership between Sawtell and interdisciplinary artist and researcher Lizzie Wilson.
Yasmeen Baig-Clifford at Vivid Projects says:
We are delighted to be partnering Hannah Sawtell on Useful Tools; Vivid Projects has developed from an open access lab model that offered residents in West Midlands access to audio visual mediums. Equitable access to the arts is embedded in our artist development programme Black Hole Club, and recent collaborative work with Antonio Roberts to develop new creative pathways for Black artists through the (Algo|Afro) Futures. Hannah’s vision for Useful Tools opens up new routes for collaboration and peer to peer learning that are generous and have a lasting impact on those who engage with it.
Biographies:
Hannah Sawtell is an artist working with sound, video, collectively built app development, installation, performance, radio and sculpture. She lives and works in London, although her background is in the electronic music scene in London and Detroit; she co-ran the label Planet E. From her life as a DJ and organiser, she started to work as a performer and artist. Sawtell’s multi-disciplinary practice is concerned with our globally connected society, and aims to provoke debate around the technology of access, labour, capital and surplus, desire and excess. Her work exploits the processes and materials accessible in the current culture of connectivity.
Lizzie Wilson is an interdisciplinary artist and researcher whose interests include live computer music, musical artificial intelligence, and human-machine co-collaboration. She is a lecturer in creative coding at the Creative Coding Institute at University of the Arts, London. Her research centres around co-creative systems between human live coders and autonomous agents. Some recent works include collaborations with the BBC’s research and development department, presenting works at ARS Electronica festival, hosting feminist hackathons, and lecturing in the fields of live coding and creative programming.