RTM’s journey draws to a close and culminates in three days of opening and discovering the artistic paths that have emerged along the way. Arriving on The Listening Biennial and available to the wider public for a week, the 3 artworks commissioned by the project’s 3 artistic partners to as many artists active in sound and artistic experimentation – Alessandro Bosetti for Area06/Short Theatre (Rome), Mia Takula & Ellen Virman for Baltic Circle (Helsinki), Maud Blandel for Parallèle (Marseille).
3 artistic objects imagined as platforms for encounter and dialogue, as participatory practices capable of giving life to works that are born as accessible to people with visual impairments, and that testify to the possibility of inventing new forms of exploration of reality, interconnection, languages and aesthetics starting from the sharing of artistic subjects. A number of realities and individual figures active in the field of visual impairment made these works possible: ASP S. Alessio Margherita Di Savoia, Marja Mikola and the Blind Listening Committee, ASLAA – Association Sports et Loisirs des Aveugles et Amblyopes.
3 artistic works that live in different natures and forms – they have been workshops, public conversations, performances, radio and installation formats – thanks to the close dialogue between the artists, the festival curators, and the communities of blind and visually impaired people, and which, after having been experienced live at the three partner festivals and having travelled between them, come together in acoustic and digital form on The Listening Biennial to spread further.
Starting on 27 March, the 3 works will be released online daily for the first time and will remain available to the public until 6 April.
This is the schedule:
27 March | h 6 pm – Alessandro Bosetti, La memoria risiede nel lobo dell’orecchio (Memory Resides in the Earlobe) [ITA]
28 March | h 6 pm – Mia Takula & Ellen Virman, Hevosen silmin (Through the eyes of a horse) [FI]
29 March | h 6 pm – Maud Blandel, Flavio Virzì and ASLAA, La vraie version (The Real Version) [FR]
THE LISTENING BIENNIAL is an artistic, research initiative focusing on listening as a relational capacity, a philosophical and political proposition, a creative practice, and research framework. It acts as an umbrella bringing together practitioners, researchers, institutions and collectives engaged in listening as a method, a tool, a poetics. This includes the creation of an international Biennial exhibition, as well as organizing the Listening Academy in different cities.
From radical empathy to sonic practice, quiet refusal to somatic wellbeing, eavesdropping to ecological attunement, listening wields a creative and critical force that may contribute to maintaining the diversity of our social adventure.
ALESSANDRO BOSETTI
La memoria risiede nel lobo dell’orecchio (Memory Resides in the Earlobe)
[ITA]
Think of a remembered or imagined sound, switch it on in your thoughts, listen to it in your mind…
A journey in-and-out, using sound as a connecting tool between acoustic evocation and creation. Composer and sound artist Alessandro Bosetti builds a hypothetical “Palace of Memory,” a physical and imaginary space containing sound memories connected to life stories, created in collaboration with a community of blind and visually impaired people attending A.S.P. Sant’Alessio Margherita di Savoia.
Bustles, sighs, melodies and words. Vicissitudes attached, like a skin, to certain sounds that resurface from a desired, rewritten, celebrated past. A place perhaps only mental, where certain memories are rediscovered as needed through meditations, exercises and experiments for which one must close one’s eyes. What does an unforgettable sound sounds like?
Behind every imagined or remembered sound is a real sound but also a memory and emotion, perhaps a story. Sound is the key to opening a drawer, finding the threads of an affair, a friendship or perhaps a trauma.
Sonic writing emerges from a convocation of sounds, and works to reconstruct, transform, reshape, and recompose them in the mind and heart. For both the listeners and the author, it is a matter of going in search of the emotions that among the sounds allow us to remember some and forget others, moving lightly in the territory between oblivion and auditory hallucination.
The title of the work draws inspiration from Maurizio Bettini‘s book Rome, City of Words. Orality Memory Law Religion Poetry (Einaudi, 2022).
The audio presented here is the first episode of a two installments radio version for Radio3 Rai that was originally aired on Saturday January 11th and Sunday January 12th, 2025.
an acoustic performance by Alessandro Bosetti
in cooperation with the community of blind and visually impaired people attending the A.S.P. Sant’Alessio Margherita di Savoia
with the voices and the words of Marco Guardati, Sonia Gioia, Giovanni Florio, Alessio Federici, Nikolaj Llevliev, Gianluigi degli Atti
thanks to Piersandra Di Matteo, Francesco Di Stefano, Matteo Angius, Marzia Bonacci
commissionated by AREA06 / Short Theatre
***
Alessandro Bosetti is a composer and sound artist whose work focuses on the musicality inherent in language and the voice as an independent object. He also produces pieces using radio as a medium and artwork focused on the art of listening. Bosetti’s music is included in the programs of numerous festivals including: Festival d’Automne in Paris, Eclat Festival in Stuttgart, Présences Electroniques festival of the GRM in Paris, Liquid Architecture Festival in Melbourne, San Francisco Electronic Music Festival, Musica Festival in Strasbourg and Ruido Festival in Buenos Aires. His music is the subject of numerous recorded publications on labels such as Xong, Kohlhaas, Errant Bodies Press, Holidays Records, Unsounds and Monotype, which in 2016 dedicated a retrospective box set to him (4 CDs). His book Thèses / Voix – a collection of texts between theory, poetry and score was published in 2021 by Les presses du réel. A vinyl version of FasFari – the most recent episode of his Plane/Talea series – as well as the Portraits des Voix CD have just been released by Xong and Kohlhaas Records.
The ASP S. Alessio – Margherita di Savoia is a historic institution that, since the second half of the nineteenth century, has been carrying out activities aimed at the social inclusion of the blind and visually impaired, in the fields of health, education, employment and social services, throughout the Lazio Region and at its offices in Rome, Frosinone and Latina.
MIA TAKULA & ELLEN VIRMAN
Hevosen silmin (Through the eyes of a horse)
[FI]
The sound art piece Hevosen silmin (in Eng. Through the Eyes of a Horse) depicts how a horse experiences its environment, fellow species, and other animals – including humans. A horse is, in many ways, a different kind of animal compared to humans, yet it still lives in a human world. How well do we consider the needs of horses?
Horses share the same basic emotions as humans, and research shows that a horse can even interpret human emotions through images. The piece includes, for example, how a horse comforted the grieving para-equestrian Marja Mikola. Mikola also shares what it’s like to work with a horse while being visually impaired. Does a horse’s way of interacting with a visually impaired person differ from how other humans treat her?
Ethologist and equine researcher Verna Vilppula presents the latest research findings on horses’ experiences, senses, communication, and friendships. Did you know, for example, that horses see significantly fewer colours than humans?
The piece is interwoven with an effort to see things from the horse’s perspective. We hear various horse sounds, sounds that are part of a horse’s life, and music composed specifically for the piece. Hevosen silmin is the kind of work that even a horse would listen to and enjoy, based on the latest available research and experiential knowledge. However, there is one particular sound that horses do not find pleasant, even though it is a part of their everyday lives.
Can you identify this sound in the piece? Why does this sound unpleasant for horses?
The piece consists of two parts: Equus Caballus and Kentauri.
script and direction Mia Takula and Ellen Virman
horses Voltti, Vastaisku, Sisu, Heta, Juuso, Hippa, Fiina, Floris (Lauri), GK Sagittari, Aatu, Roosa, Wallu, Masi
humans Marja Mikola and Verna Vilppula
Marja’s coach Suvi Kettunen
As well as wild birds present by chance.
reader for the opening and closing credits Alex Andra Rekola
journalist Mia Takula
sound design and composition Ellen Virman
photography Mia Takula
image Katri Astala
commissioned by Baltic Circle
thanks to all the people featured in the piece, Aira Melasniemi, Suvi Kettunen, Nybacka Dressage, Salli Saarela, Equestrian Federation of Finland, Terhi Kujala, Anna-Maria Vilkuna and Matti Harjuniemi, Johanna Perttunen, Moto the dog
***
Mia Takula (b. 1975) is a writer, documentarian, and journalist. She has worked in the arts and media fields for over 25 years. Takula’s main themes are the intrinsic value of animals, nature, the eco-crisis, and humanity. Despite these strong themes, Takula aims to encourage rather than blame. She sees the potential for change. Takula has worked on books, documentaries, TV series, hundreds of magazine articles, photography, and audio works. In September, her third book, The Survival Guide, addressing the eco-crisis and survival, was published. Her previous work, In the Land of Wolves, received the Pro Animalia award.
Ellen Virman works broadly in radio, performing arts, and music. Virman is interested in combining documentary and fantasy, as well as presenting social issues in an accessible form. The piece Animal Delusion – Animals Do Not Speak, created with Mia Takula, was Yle’s candidate for the Prix Europa competition in the category of Best Radio Documentary of 2023. In September, Virman’s sound-designed six-part audio series Taylor Swift, minun versioni, which explores the significance of the superstar to her fans, was released.
MAUD BLANDEL, FLAVIO VIRZÌ AND ASLAA
La vraie version (The Real Version)
[FR]
‘During our encounters, we seek to bear witness to the voices that have marked our lives, both spoken and sung, to revive these voices through our own, but also to invent ways of restoring a song that has been kept secret from the listener: through our descriptions, our translations and our different forms of interpretation’. – Maud Blandel
Choreographer Maud Blandel, composer and guitarist Flavio Virzì and members of ASLAA – Association Sports et Loisirs pour Aveugles et Amblyopes have joined forces to create a radio piece exploring the relationship between voice, memory and emotion. At the crossroads of sound research, the performing arts and a reflection on the accessibility of works for the visually impaired, La vraie version is part of the European Radio That Matters project. In this project, artists, radio stations and associations for the visually impaired are invited to work together to create innovative artistic forms that make the festival experience and content accessible to all.
The radio creations was followed by a public conversation about the project and broadcasted live on Radio Grenouille.
in partnership with GMEM – Centre national de création musicale and Radio Grenouille
with the support of Centre culturel suisse. On tour
with El Hadi Guidoum, Cherifa Harzallah, Angélique Huguenin, Karim Maameri, Karim Slaoui and Janine Williams from ASLAA — Association Sports et Loisirs des Aveugles et Amblyopes
written, directed and edited by Maud Blandel and Flavio Virzì
musical creation and mixing Flavio Virzì
lighting design Edouard Hügli
production Radio That Matters, Festival Parallèle, I L K A
residencies GMEM – Centre national de création musicale, Euphonia l’Atelier-Studio, Radio Grenouille
Thanks to Marie Féréol, Olympe Verdeil-Novara, Jean-Baptiste Imbert, Elodie Olson-Coons, Maya Masse, Louis Schild, Lello and Sonja Horlacher, ASLAA (Association Sports et Loisirs pour Aveugles et Amblyopes) and the GMEM team
***
Maud Blandel (FR/CH) is a choreographer based in Lausanne. Trained in Toulouse, then at La Manufacture and HEAD, she founded the I L K A association in 2015. Driven by her passion for musicality and dramaturgy, her choreographic approach explores physicality and states of presence resulting from a constant tension between the collective and individual expressivity. A resident at Arsenic (Lausanne) since 2018, she is an associate artist at CNDC Angers and Bonlieu – Scène nationale d’Annecy for 2024-2026.
Flavio Virzì (born 1984, Palermo) is a guitarist and composer. Trained in classical guitar at the Palermo Conservatory and the École Normale de Musique de Paris, he later studied contemporary music at the Basel Music Academy. His adventurous approach leads him to diverse repertoires and collaborations across disciplines. He has performed with ensembles such as Ictus, Contrechamps, and Staatsoper Hamburg. His compositions blend microtonal harmonies, non-European traditions, and improvisation. Published by Wergo and Stradivarius, he has collaborated with Maud Blandel since 2021, on the re-creation of Diverti Menti, the sound creation of L’œil nu (2023) and the radio piece La vraie version (2025) which he co-signed.
The non-profit Association Sports et Loisirs pour Aveugles et Amblyopes, created in 1973, aims to promote sports and cultural activities for people with visual impairments. While the integration of the visually impaired is not always possible in schools and workplaces, the association strives to promote it through sports and leisure activities. Cross-country and tandem skiing activities, in addition to the sporting aspect, have a significant educational contribution: it requires the blind person to have qualities that are essential for their mobility-reflexes, flexibility, sense of direction, knowing how to overcome apprehension, feeling the terrain, and having great confidence in oneself and in others.
Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor EACEA can be held responsible for them.