The Speaker Tower channels Ícaro Aéreo
Nicolás Kisic Aguirre
Performance and Artist Talk:
Saturday, October 14, 2023 - 6:30pm
Created in 2017, the Speaker Tower is a technological device that looks to claim sonic space for public occupation and activation. It is a portable, double sided, rotating loudspeaker system that can be deployed both as an instrument of protest and as an instrument of peace. Conceived as a piece of cultural infrastructure situated within an urban environment, this work is a tool for expanding our access to the invisible dimension of the city.
For The Speaker Tower channels Ícaro Aéreo, Artist Rawa Muñoz and I collaborated on a joint piece that uses the Speaker Tower to archive, transmit, and amplify Rawa’s voice and message. This broadcast was delivered in the form of an Ícaro, the sacred chant of the Shipibo-Konibo, an indigenous population from the Peruvian Amazon.
Nicolás Kisic Aguirre is an architect and transdisciplinary sound artist who creates machines that explore and illuminate the social and political nature of sound in public space. In 2018, he graduated from the MITprogram in Art, Culture and Technology. Informed by his background in architecture and a lifelong fascination with machines, Kisic Aguirre designs and builds sound instruments that explore the connection between public space, power, technology, and sound. His critical and aesthetic practice is open-source, collaborative, and deeply engaged with the public. Nicolás is currently a Ph.D. student in the DXArts program at the University of Washington Seattle.
About SPAM New Media Festival:
This year we launch SPAM, a Seattle based experimental arts festival which brings together practitioners working on the fringes and frontiers of new media art and knowledge production. Taking place at various venues across Seattle, the yearly festival consists of a program of exhibitions, performances and discussions rooted in, or emerging from, technology driven art and digital culture. This includes, but is not limited to, the projects of artists and researchers working within the fields of AI, robotics, sound, experimental video, VR, wearable technology, photogrammetry and radio.
For this year’s program, SPAM is thankful to be collaborating with Henry Art Gallery, Mini Mart City Park, Method Gallery, Gallery 4Culture, Jack Straw Cultural Center, Georgetown Steam Plant and Meany Hall at the University of Washington.
Please visit our website to see more about this year’s program of exhibitions, performances, and participating artists.