SHAPE+ is a platform for innovative music and audiovisual art from Europe.
It consists of 16 festivals and art centers and aims to support, promote and exchange innovative and aspiring musicians and interdisciplinary artists with an interest in sound. SHAPE attempts to present a variety of idiosyncratic music and sonic art from all over Europe, and provide audiences and professionals with insightful lectures, talks and workshops by experts in various fields related to sound and performance.
Each year, the 16 involved associations will collectively choose 48 creatively strong artists and musicians to participate in a mix of live performances, residencies, workshops and talks across festivals and special events.
SHAPE+ is an initiative, co-funded by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union.
The member festivals and art centers of SHAPE are:
INKONST + INTONAL Festival
CTM Festival / DISK e.V. – Berlin, DE
depart-one – Dresden, DE
Festival Maintenant / Association Electroni[K] – Rennes, FR
Insomnia Festival / Association – Tromso, NO
Les siestes électroniques / Association Rotation – Toulouse, FR
Meet Factory – Prague, CZ
MoTA – Museum for Transitory Art – Ljubljana, SL
musikprotokoll im steirischen herbst / ORF – Graz, AT
RIAM Festival / Technè – Marseilles, FR
Rokolectiv Festival / Association – Bucharest, RO
Schiev Festival / Black Drop Productions – Brussels, BE
Skaņu Mežs Festival / Association – Riga, LV
Terraforma / – Milano, IT
TodaysArt Festival / The Generator Foundation – The Hague, NL
UH Festival / Ultrasound Foundation – Budapest, HU
Unsound Festival / Fundacja Tone – Krakow, PL
This book celebrates the second phase of SHAPE (Sound, Heterogeneous Art and Performance in Europe), between 2018 and 2022. The platform supports mainly emerging and at times less explored innovative music and audiovisual art from various parts of Europe. SHAPE is run by 16 festivals and organisations that worked with 192 artistic projects during this period. First and foremost, this publication is a collection of selected interviews with some of these artists.
The founders of SHAPE hope that these conversations will give to the reader an insight into the diverse world of adventurous European sound and interdisciplinary artists who, with some exceptions, have escaped broader international attention. When speaking to the artists, we got to hear what motivates and inspires them, what backgrounds they are from, what pleases or worries them about their current situation (both creatively and socially), and where they hope to arrive. Their answers were just as diverse as their work, and there are many colourful opinions – sometimes even contradictory ones – which allow the reader to conjure a hypothetical future of the fields of music and art.
Beyond that, this book is a catalogue of names in music and audiovisual art that the reader might want to follow in the future. By nominating them for the SHAPE project, curators from 16 festivals wanted to draw attention to the idiosyncratic and innovative work they have done so far, and to suggest that these artists represent ideas, methods, and trends that will shape the nearest future of both aforementioned fields.
HAPPY READING!
