Event overview
Diane Schuh, a landscape gardener and electro-acoustic music composer working on notions of trans-species symbiosis, to deliver the next Whitehead Lecture
Abstract:
This talk will examine listening as a means of cultivating attention to the living, proposing it as a sensitive modality for engaging in dynamic interactions between humans and non-humans. Drawing on the interdisciplinary methodologies of landscape architecture and computer music, my research investigates how models of living systems can inform creative processes that foster a relational ecology.
The notion of “making-garden” serves as a conceptual and practical framework, developed through fieldwork in the Garden in Motion at the Maison des Sciences de l’Homme Paris Nord. This approach links gardening practices with soundscape analysis, recording, and re- composition, revealing the plural and entangled nature of listening as a tool for transforming perspectives on nature and fostering collective ecological awareness.
Building on this foundation, I will explore how principles from the garden, such as symbiosis and self-organization, can be translated into musical composition. I will present two experimental devices that incorporate computer music tools. The first project called LICHENS examines the Garden in Motion as a site for fieldwork and participatory listening practices aided by computer music tools. From these experiences emerges a methodology inspired by Anna Tsing’s concept of the “Art of Noticing.” The second project called “Mycelium Garden” employs bioelectric signals from mycelium networks to transform real-time human electroacoustic compositions, challenging anthropocentric perspectives and exploring interspecies co-creation.
These devices, grounded in the theories of complexity and emergence, challenge static notions of composition by emphasizing interaction, feedback, and the co-creation of adaptive musical environments. I argue that the model of sympoiesis (Dempster 2000; Haraway 2016), and more specifically what we define as “symbiosis by adjusting differences” (Guillo 2019), can be relevant to the design of compositions and installations conceived as dynamic, interactionist processes. These encourage emergence phenomena and value singularity and diversity, in an open, adaptive model that invites attention to the living through listening.
Short Bio:
Diane Schuh is a composer, researcher and landscape architect. She holds a PhD in aesthetics, arts science and technology, majoring in music (Université Paris 8) and a Diplôme d'État (D.P.L.G.) in landscape architecture and design (ENSP Versailles). She studied violin at the Conservatoire and composition with José-Manuel López López. In this context, she composed pieces for 2e2m, Ensemble Cairn and Ensemble Sinkro. Her doctorate thesis studies the transfer of models and methods from gardening to composition. n 2023 she won the EUR ArTec call for research projects for her Mycelium Garden project and the MSH Paris Nord call for projects for her LICHENS project.
Dates & times
| Date | Time | Add to calendar |
|---|---|---|
| 26 Feb 2025 | 5:00pm - 6:30pm |
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