WORLD LISTENING PROJECT

Pianist, educator, and sound researcher. Ph.D. Candidate in Arts at the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura (INBAL) in Mexico City.  Piano teacher at the Universidad de las Américas Puebla (UDLAP). She holds a master’s degree in Piano Performance from Brooklyn College. As a pianist, Mora is interested in Contemporary music repertoire with a gender perspective. She has performed in Mexico, Canada, and the United States. Her research focuses on experimental music and interdisciplinary practices by women and non-binary artists. She co-produces the MINGA radio program streamed weekly by Radio CASo (Centro de Arte Sonoro- Argentina). She collaborates with the platform MUSEXPLAT (Música Experimental Latinoamericana) where she also hosts a conversational virtual space called La Sobremesa as part of the same platform.

Gurkan Maruf Mihci is Assistant Professor at IUPUI Herron School of Art and Design and pursues his PhD at Istanbul Institute of Design. He has his Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree in Graphic Design (Bilkent University) and, Master of Arts in Visual Arts and Visual Communication Design (Sabanci University) with a concentration in Audio Visual Noise and Glitch. He also has a Central European University Graduate Certificate in Culture and Politics.

J.L. Simonson is a universal community member and sound artist enamored by transgressive temporalities, the sonic power of diaspora, and the potential energy of interstellar listening. They use forgotten and found sounds in addition to piano, guitar, and synthesizers to create installations and electroacoustic compositions. Multidimensional lensing, trauma-informed compassion, and intersectional justice are the guides of their professional and creative practice.

They are a two-time recipient of both the PRAXIS Career and Susan Rose Scholarships in Musical Advancement, as well as a Northampton Arts Council Community Arts Grant recipient. Their creative work has also been supported by The Pauline Oliveros Trust, Ministry of Maåt, Great Lakes Association of Sound Studies, The Jones Institute, Hampshire College, Temple University, the Midwest Society for Acoustic Ecology, and the Chicago Parks District.

Whale song and spring peeper choruses, coyote yawps and saxophone skronks, creek babbles and predawn wave crashes, rolling thunder geophony and the sound of a garden at night — these are some of Dan’s favorite things. He is a Chicago-based educator and artist, and is among WLP’s founders.

Dr. Diana Chester is a sound studies scholar, composer, educator, and artist. Diana’s work uses sound to traverse disciplinary boundaries and explore sonic capacities core to the human condition, and as a tool to re-presence our historical past. This work draws from sound studies, archival studies, and the ethnographic study of expressive culture in religious festivals and traditions. Diana’s research is largely practice-based and relies on field recording and composition to explore sound in diverse contexts around the world working fluidly with multilingual, environmental, and data generated sounds. Current explorations include the study of sound and culture focused on religion and the environment, the audio essay as a form of sonic scholarship, and new artistic methods and practices at the intersection of spacialized media technologies and scientific research. The work is driven by a desire to tell stories using sound, technology, and composition. Diana’s monograph, Sonic Encounters: The Islamic Call to Prayer is a glimpse into the creative, methodological, and artistic implications of a 10-year research project making field recordings of (adhan) the Islamic call to prayer, and sits alongside a broader body of academic and creative work including numerous journal articles on sound, audio essays, and solo exhibitions in five countries. These include exhibitions at the InterArtsCenter in Sweden, Gallery25 in Perth Australia, Gallery 4211 in Abu Dhabi, and a forthcoming soundscape for the Smithsonian currently being developed for installation on the Mall in Washington, DC. Diana currently holds a lecturer position in the Department of Media and Communication at the University of Sydney. 

Alex Braidwood is a sound artist, media designer, and educator who maintains a practice exploring issues of sustainability at the intersection of art and science. He has exhibited art, led workshops, lectured on his work, and performed live at a variety of events and venues throughout the US, Europe, Asia, and Australia. He has been an artist in residence in an Australian mountain village, on an Iowa farm, at a mid-western biological field research station, and on Isle Royale National Park. Alex is Director of the Artist-in-Residence program at Iowa Lakeside Lab field research station as well as Director of Graphic Design Graduate Education and faculty in the Human Computer Interaction program at Iowa State University. He is Artistic Director for Group Creatives, a Des Moines-based organization helping midwest cities develop and implement public art master plans. He has also served as Secretary for the Midwest Society for Acoustic Ecology (MSAE) board of directors as MSAE representative on the World Forum for Acoustic Ecology board of directors.