Avatar residency-Phonurgia Nova Awards 2023
Call for proposals
Avatar and Phonurgia Nova are joining forces to open a new production residency for the Phonurgia Nova Awards 2023.
These residencies are awarded on a “project” basis, and take place in partner studios: GMEM center national de création musicale (Marseille), Euphonia (Marseille), Art Zoyd (Valenciennes) and, for the first time this year, Avatar (Quebec). Each grant is worth €2,000. They provide the opportunity to start or finalize a radio or sound art project, while benefiting from tailor-made technical and artistic support.
Avatar and Phonurgia Nova offer optimal conditions for this residency. At Avatar, the selected artist will have access to a recording studio, a control room, an editing studio, an electronic laboratory and a workspace to support exploration, discussion and production, and will benefit from cutting-edge artistic and technical support to bring his or her creative project to fruition.
Residency conditions offered by Avatar:
A 2-week research and creation residency at Avatar in Quebec City (fall 2024 or spring 2025).
Artistic and technical assistance 14h/week.
Loan of production and post-production spaces and specialized equipment.
Residency fee of $2200.
Assistance in finding accommodation in Quebec City.
Residency conditions offered by Phonurgia Nova:
Phonurgia Nova funding of €2,000 (transportation, accommodation, per diem).
Online registration is open until midnight July 30, 2023.
Avatar is dedicated to the research, creation, production, dissemination, publication, and circulation of audio and electronic artworks and artists.
To support creation, Avatar organizes projects, invites artists, reflects on practices, and encourages new collaborations through local and international networks. Located in the heart of Québec City, Avatar offers a venue for interactions and initiatives, explores new artistic terrains, and provides access to equipment and specialized skills.
Since its founding in 1993, Avatar has been an innovator in audio and electronic arts research in North America. At Avatar, audio and electronic creation covers a broad range of activities, including the creation of listening devices, the invention and circuit bending of instruments, sound installation, performance, radio art, and sound sculpture. Audio art crosses the fields of music, visual arts, and poetry and is open to hybrid forms of audible performance, sound excavations, and acoustic environments. Avatar also develops programming of custom-made software and electronic interfaces, as well as interactive and kinetic installation systems and telematic works.
Avatar hosts artists, researchers, thinkers, hackers, and students, listening to their needs and adapting itself to support the most unconventional artistic dreams.
Initiated in 1986 with the complicity of Pierre Schaeffer, the association teaches this radio that moves away from everyday radio to something else: fiction, documentary, sound art sometimes. Radio, podcast or live performance? No restrictions. Whether from Arles, Paris or now Dinard, Phonurgia Nova propagates a multifaceted sound art and invents manifestations to its measure to conquer new ears. Its influence is national and international.
Where did the name Phonurgia Nova come from? This was originally the title that the German Jesuit Father Athanasius Kircher gave in 1673 to an amazing book in which, well before the time of their technical realization, he imagined astonishing acoustic architectures. There is an extensive online documentation of his “talking statues” and other speculations about “communication machines”.
Header image: the Avatar studio, Credit: Marion Gotti
