KISMIF 4: de Llera Blanes and Claussen – 21st Century Music Practice

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Simon Zagorski-Thomas says:

August 5, 2026 at 4:21 pm

Thanks for this video Jan and Guillermo – not only very stimulating in regard to the content and the discussion but it was great to see such positive reactions to the Research Challenge format. I have three comments that relate to both of your work – and I’ll try to weave them into questions.
1. Somebody mentioned McLuhan and the Medium As The Message but the contrast between your works (in both videos) made me think about transparency. It may be too blunt but in the first pair of videos I saw Jan’s video work as relatively transparent (although it had the cultural footprint of 21st Century hand-held digital video) and his music as highly opaque (in the sense that the production technology’s footprints were just as audible as the guitar playing). Guillermo’s work was the other way round – the video ‘medium’ was opaque (in the sense that the processing drew as much attention as the content) whereas the music was more transparent (at least the tabla sounds were). That shifted in the second set of videos to everything being more opaque – in the sense that the processing / post-production became more the point of focus than the content. Given Jan’s point about the tools perhaps being the cultural artefacts that we should be preserving (more on that in the next point) – I’m interested in how and how much you think the processing contributes to the messages and how much it functions as an expression of your personal artistic identity? And how that affects what you’re trying to communicate – how much does it make what you’re trying to say more engaging and how much does it distance the audience from the content by making the medium more interesting than the content?
2. I was also interested by the discussion about archiving and museum culture. Collections mostly say more about the collectors than the objects. Nineteenth century collections in Europe (and America) are about objects that support the notion of a trajectory from the classical Northern Mediterranean world to the Age of Enlightenment with the ‘other’ being exotic and/or exotic. But they also reflect the notion of dominance – over ‘other’ peoples and over nature. 21st century approaches to collection and archives strive to be more inclusive and egalitarian but are equally obsessed with telling stories. When Guillermo mentioned modern archives trying to engage new audiences, I immediately thought of gamification, immersion and simulation. I wonder what you think about what 21st century collections tell us about our culture (as the collectors) and what your work says about you?
3. My final thought’s about the more general question of what this particular Research Challenge was aiming at: the CFP talked about how your work “explains not just the ideological/critical theme you are addressing, but also how you will experiment with your musical and/or visual ideas to get your message across”. I’m interested in the functional aspect of ‘getting your message across’. Are we preaching to the converted when we create ideological work? And, if not, what do you think are the mechanisms by which artistic practice actually makes a difference in the world? Michael, whose work triggered the idea of this challenge, is involved in the (mostly) Canadian movement of Research-Creation: the alignment of artistic practice to practical projects as a tool to shed light on how to think about the problem (rather than just ‘that we should think about the problem’ or even ‘that therre is a problem’). I imagine that Jan’s inclusion in a wider research project will have involved some discussion of this. What are your (both of you) thoughts on what your work should be doing?
I’d just like to finish by saying I really enjoyed both the artistic and the intellectual content of this piece.

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Research Problem

The Research Challenge was initiated by the following Call For Participation

KISMIF Conference, convened by Andy Bennett and Paula Guerra in Porto, Portugal is, so far, the only congress in the world that analyzes the theory and practice of underground scenes and DIY cultures as increasingly significant cultural forms in a global context of precariousness and uncertainty. In keeping with this year’s KISMIF theme of ‘social innovation in times of global crisis’, we want to use practice research / artistic research / research-creation to explore how practitioners embody socio-cultural and political ideas into their creative work beyond the literal portrayals of lyrical and video narratives.

We are looking for 6 – 8 researcher/practitioners who are planning to attend KISMIF 2026 to participate in a Practice Research Challenge about using DIY production techniques to create a piece of music (with an accompanying video) that embodies some ideological/critical message. (KISMIF conference registration is a requirement of participation).

In addition to making a music video for your new 3 – 4 minute song (or other piece of music), we want you to make a 6 – 7 minute video that explains and demonstrates how else, apart from literal lyrics and images, you used musical or visual metaphors, form, structure or other devices to embody/realize your message – and, with an emphasis on process, how you experimented with ideas to get there.

Then we want you to watch someone else’s video and re-make yours differently, inspired by their ideas. Then we want the two of you to discuss the process and what you may have learned from it.

This will all happen in May and June and be conducted online. We’ll then hold an event during KISMIF to show some of the work, discuss the process and try to draw some conclusions that are useful for politically engaged practitioners.

It is quite a fast turn-around so please ensure you read the timetable below to make sure you have the time to participate if selected.

The 21st Century Music Practice Research Centre is collaborating with KISMIF to run this – another in our series of our Practice Research Challenges. Those chosen to participate in the project will produce a video which will be published by the researchcentre in conjunction with Research UK’s JISC Octopus.ac format – as a joint authored, DOI allocated, peer reviewed, practice research output.

Think of an idea or approach for experimenting with your music and video making approach. You need to write a proposal that explains not just the ideological/critical theme you are addressing, but also how you will experiment with your musical and/or visual ideas to get your message across. You will need to send your written proposal by 31^st March 2026 (max 200 words plus a one page CV).

If you are selected to participate, you will be asked to:

Film yourself experimenting with the idea / approach until you come up with something you think is interesting
Edit together a 10 minute video showing:

6 – 7 minutes showing what your initial idea was and how experimenting with it produced new ideas / results – you may want to show things that didn’t work as well as those that did.
the other 3 – 4 minutes is for your music video. Remember – this is about keeping it simple and making it fast, so we’re expecting a DIY aesthetic rather than high production values.

You can combine commentary or annotations (arrows, circles, subtitles etc) with videos of performance.

Phone videos are acceptable. We are not expecting professional-level film-making but please produce the best audio and video quality that you can and please film in landscape rather than portrait format.

Submit the video before 30^th April 2026 – we will let the chosen participants know how to submit the video.

As soon as possible after that, you will receive a video by another participant (who will receive your video in exchange). Watch it and do the same thing again using that video as the basis for the same process (i.e. exploring what their ideas stimulate you to do). You might re-arrange or even re-write your song based on their ideas and/or re-edit or re-make your video. It doesn’t have to be entirely new – but it can be…

Next Phase:

Submit that second video before 31^st May 2026 and watch the video the other participant made based on your video.

Before 22^nd June 2026 you will film and edit a 20 minute discussion with that participant using Teams or Zoom:

10 minutes exploring how the two of you interpreted the challenge – where you think your approach came from and how you reacted to the other person’s
10 minutes analysing what happened – how your decisions and approaches (and being stimulated by theirs) shaped the outcome.
These videos would then be edited together into a 60 minute video and published by the virtual research centre in conjunction with the JISC Octopus.ac format – as a joint authored, DOI allocated, peer reviewed, practice research output. The 60 minute format will therefore comprise:

10 minute of your first video
10 minutes of their first video
10 minutes of your 2nd video responding to theirs
10 minutes of their 2nd video responding to yours
10 minute discussion of how the two of you interpreted the challenge
10 minute discussion of your joint analysis of the process and outcome

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Publication Type: Research Problem

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Rationale / Hypothesis

Proposal

Guillermo Modellera

I am proposing a DIY practice-research experiment that extends my Nepal/Everest research-creation cycle. Alongside a graphic novel and its companion album (in print), and the publication and soundtrack album “Trek to Everest Base Camp: (Re)composing a Sound Trek and (Re)experiencing as Soundscape Remix”, I now want to test a new method: “archive as instrument.”

The visual material will combine my personal Everest/Nepal archive (photos/video fragments) with public-domain archival photographs of Nepal. The premise is that reuse is not neutral: when archival images are made performable, they are pulled back into circulation and re-signified in the present.

The work is performed live with two MidiMbiras, a DIY instrument I invented in collaboration with mbira makers in Mozambique for my PhD. MidiMbira A selects and reorders rhythmic tabla loops and Nepalese sarangi phrases, building a strict cyclic time-base. MidiMbira B performs ambient/electronic sound and controls loop states and effects (filtering, decay, spatialisation).

I will begin from three rule-sets—rhizomatic re-routing (Deleuze/Guattari assemblage), Hindu cyclic return, and Buddhist impermanence/decay—and film successive iterations, including what fails, until the minimum ruleset reads clearly. The 6–7 minute video documents the experiments; the final 3–4 minutes present the finished music video.

Proposal: Playing ecological echoes on guitar strings

Dr. Jan T. Claussen

Numerous studies show that biodiversity is steadily declining. The starting point for thisresearch project is the dilemma that while data from scientific research consistently demonstrate the decline in biodiversity and the increasing impacts of climate change, these rather abstract data rarely penetrate the consciousness of their audience or trigger behavioral changes. Artistic projects, through field recordings, sound art, and music productions, performeducational work here that can reach people emotionally and affectively via various channels
of perception (Monacchi & Krause, 2017).
In my piece, I therefore aim to use field recordings from the forest to raise awareness of the polyphony and biodiversity of local environments. To do this, I proceed as follows:
1. The field recordings, which I enjoy documenting on vides, serve as training data for an AI that enable me to generate a timbre which I can then play on my electric guitar. The aim is to create hybrid sounds blending guitar and for example bird calls that aesthetically reflect the connection between humans and nature.
2. I will use an experimental reverb (provided to me by the Hamburg University of Music and Drama) that originates from a dismantled coal-fired power plant in Hamburg Moorburg. Once again, a political dilemma becomes apparent here. A wonderfully sounding reverb that can still be used in a composition—even after the dismantling of its environmentally harmful place of origin—which in turn draws attention to the decline in biodiversity caused by such
places.

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Publication Type: Rationale / Hypothesis

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Language: English

Licence: CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

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Method

This protocol establishes a structured method for collaborative practice research between two music practitioners through asynchronous video exchange. Participants independently develop proposals and create 10-minute videos exploring a practice concept, technique, or approach. Videos are exchanged, prompting each participant to create a second 10-minute response exploring how their partner’s work stimulates new directions in their own practice. The process concludes with a 20-minute filmed discussion analysing interpretative choices and outcomes. The protocol produces a 60-minute structure, serving as peer-reviewed, DOI-allocated practice research output via JISC Octopus. This method makes tacit practice knowledge explicit and generates transferable insights into practice innovation.

For further details see: https://doi.org/10.57874/s80m-1g18