I am a Chilean sound artist, composer, and researcher based in Lisbon. My practice investigates imagination as an operative process through which technical, material, and social relations can be reorganised and other futures brought into articulation.
Working across sound, audiovisual performance, installation in situation-specific formats, I set open systems whose behaviour emerges through the encounter between the system and its alterity, approaching creation as a process of transduction in which sensible and technical operations continually transform one another.
Forms of organisation are central to my research. I am interested in how artistic devices distribute agency, structure relations, and make particular modes of thought, imagination and agency possible. My work explores the capacity of such open technical systems to articulate artistic and social questions, collective desires, and alternative orientations toward the future. In this context, I understand imagination not as an escape from reality, but as a material and anticipatory force that participates in shaping what can become real.
My work has been presented at international festivals focused on sound, including Novas Frequências (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), Lisboa Soa (Lisbon, Portugal), and Espacios Resonantes (Santiago, Chile). It has also been presented in institutional contexts, including as a permanent work at the National Museum of Music (Portugal) and in collective sound art exhibitions at Collegium Hungaricum Berlin and Kunstsammlung Gera (Germany). The work also circulates through local and independent contexts, including Festival Temporal (Porto, Portugal), Festival Cidade Preocupada, organised by Oficinas do Convento (Montemor-o-Novo, Portugal), performances organised by Laboratorio del Eco (Valparaíso, Chile), Hotelier (Porto, Portugal), and Nariz Entupido (Lisbon, Portugal), as well as a radio residency at Rádio Quântica (Lisbon, Portugal).
In parallel, I collaborate creatively on works presented within contemporary art, media-art, and performative arts platforms, including Alkantara/Espaço do Tempo, Art Basel (with Maotik Studio), the Bienal de Cerveira, the BoCA Biennial of Contemporary Arts, Pergine Festival, and ZKM ne(x)t_generation. I also contribute in a technical capacity through sound design and spatial audio work, including the Brazil Pavilion at Expo 2020 and the Cluster of Excellence Matters of Activity. Teaching has been another important mode of collaboration for me, including programs at Museu do Amanhã (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), Toda la Teoría del Universo (Concepción, Chile) and Instituto Tecnoaural (Santiago. Chile).
My background combines artistic research and technical training. I hold an MA in Sound Studies and Sonic Arts from the Universität der Künste Berlin and an MSc in Electronic Engineering from the Universidad Técnica Federico Santa María (Valparaíso, Chile).
A part of this work has taken shape through art residency situations, most notably at Sound Art Lab (Struer, Denmark), within Bridges to the Unknown at the Champalimaud Foundation (Lisbon), and at Ars Electronica & the Institute for Digital Science (Linz, Austria), among many others in Europe and Latin America.
My practice has been supported by grants and awards from the Directorate-General for the Arts (DGArtes, Portugal), the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT, Portugal), the Ministry of Cultures, Arts and Heritage (Chile), the National Fund for Scientific and Technological Development (Chile), Culture Moves Europe (European Union), and the British Council (United Kingdom).
Working across sound, audiovisual performance, installation in situation-specific formats, I set open systems whose behaviour emerges through the encounter between the system and its alterity, approaching creation as a process of transduction in which sensible and technical operations continually transform one another.
Forms of organisation are central to my research. I am interested in how artistic devices distribute agency, structure relations, and make particular modes of thought, imagination and agency possible. My work explores the capacity of such open technical systems to articulate artistic and social questions, collective desires, and alternative orientations toward the future. In this context, I understand imagination not as an escape from reality, but as a material and anticipatory force that participates in shaping what can become real.
My work has been presented at international festivals focused on sound, including Novas Frequências (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), Lisboa Soa (Lisbon, Portugal), and Espacios Resonantes (Santiago, Chile). It has also been presented in institutional contexts, including as a permanent work at the National Museum of Music (Portugal) and in collective sound art exhibitions at Collegium Hungaricum Berlin and Kunstsammlung Gera (Germany). The work also circulates through local and independent contexts, including Festival Temporal (Porto, Portugal), Festival Cidade Preocupada, organised by Oficinas do Convento (Montemor-o-Novo, Portugal), performances organised by Laboratorio del Eco (Valparaíso, Chile), Hotelier (Porto, Portugal), and Nariz Entupido (Lisbon, Portugal), as well as a radio residency at Rádio Quântica (Lisbon, Portugal).
In parallel, I collaborate creatively on works presented within contemporary art, media-art, and performative arts platforms, including Alkantara/Espaço do Tempo, Art Basel (with Maotik Studio), the Bienal de Cerveira, the BoCA Biennial of Contemporary Arts, Pergine Festival, and ZKM ne(x)t_generation. I also contribute in a technical capacity through sound design and spatial audio work, including the Brazil Pavilion at Expo 2020 and the Cluster of Excellence Matters of Activity. Teaching has been another important mode of collaboration for me, including programs at Museu do Amanhã (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), Toda la Teoría del Universo (Concepción, Chile) and Instituto Tecnoaural (Santiago. Chile).
My background combines artistic research and technical training. I hold an MA in Sound Studies and Sonic Arts from the Universität der Künste Berlin and an MSc in Electronic Engineering from the Universidad Técnica Federico Santa María (Valparaíso, Chile).
A part of this work has taken shape through art residency situations, most notably at Sound Art Lab (Struer, Denmark), within Bridges to the Unknown at the Champalimaud Foundation (Lisbon), and at Ars Electronica & the Institute for Digital Science (Linz, Austria), among many others in Europe and Latin America.
My practice has been supported by grants and awards from the Directorate-General for the Arts (DGArtes, Portugal), the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT, Portugal), the Ministry of Cultures, Arts and Heritage (Chile), the National Fund for Scientific and Technological Development (Chile), Culture Moves Europe (European Union), and the British Council (United Kingdom).
© Joaquín Espinoza