​​„The origin of all things, all forms, ultimately comes from movement.“ – Mary Vieira

In traditional music, sound and movement are directly linked—gesture shapes tone. In the digital context, movement and sound are suddenly detached from one another: sound can arise independently of movement, and gestures can sound very different from what the eye perceives. In the rooms of ZiMMT at Kontor 80, sens move explores new relationships between sound and movement in 3D audio concerts, performances, talks, workshops, and an exhibition.

DAY 1 (WE 26.11.)

From 6:00 p.m.
Panel discussion

Audiovisual concert: Sabina Covarrubias and

Opening performance: Thomas Laigle with glowing bacteria

Exhibition

DAY 2 (TH 27.11.)

6:00 p.m.
Lecture: Stijn Dickel – aifoon Chorus of footsteps

From 8:00 p.m.
Dance and sound performance: Sara Létourneau & Chantale Boulianne

Concert: Max Burstyn, Yongbom Lee, Babett Niclas & Agata Patyczek

DAY 3 (FR 28.11.)

1:00–3:00 p.m.
Workshop with Robert Wechsler

6:00 p.m.
Lecture: Robert Wechsler & Philipp Schmalfuß

From 8:00 p.m.
Dance and sound performance: Jakob Gruhl, Cheetah Dragon, Tomoko Nakasato & Juliane Zöllner

Audiovisual concert – Shasha Chen

DAY 4 (SA 29.11.)

2:00–4:00 p.m.
Workshop: Sara Létourneau & Chantale Boulianne

6:00 p.m.
Lecture: Alexander Schubert

From 8:00 p.m.
Dance and sound performance: Clara Sjölin & Paul Hauptmeier

3D audio concert: YAAND & urbau

3D audio concert: Cosmic Bride

DAY 5 (SU 30.11.)

1–2 p.m. /2–3 p.m. / 3–4 p.m.
Britt Hatzius: Moving out Loud (Immersive sound and haptic experience)

4:00 p.m.–8:00 p.m.
Exhibition

DAY 6–8

4:00 p.m.–8:00 p.m.
Exhibition

Festival Pass

The ticket for all concerts, performances, lectures, and exhibitions.
• Full Festival: 45€
• Early Bird Ticket: 35€ (available until October 28)

exhibition

8€ (regular)
5€ (reduced)
12€ (solidarity)

Opening (26.11.)

Grand opening with panel discussion & concert
5€

Workshops

18€
(Tickets are only available online.)

Performances

18€ (regular)
13€ (reduced)
20€ (solidarity)

  • Tickets are available online or at the entrance; workshop tickets are available online only.
  • Severely disabled persons and their accompanying persons receive free admission.

The origin of all things, all forms, ultimately comes from movement..“ – Mary Vieira

Movement is energy. Living bodies convert chemical energy from food into kinetic energy, muscles contract and relax antagonistically, proteins pull on each other in their fibers. Movement is repositioning, rearranging—not just of limbs. The power of the collective social will to shape the world is also understood as social movement, and when a deadlocked situation breaks out of its stagnation, then, proverbially speaking, things finally start to move.

In ancient Greek, movement is called “kinetics,” so kinetic art is created through movement—either by an object being able to move itself mechanically or by changing through the movement of the viewer. Without movement, it is difficult to change one’s own perspective.

In music, visible movement has long been inextricably linked to audible sound: a hand striking a drum or keyboard quickly and forcefully produces a much louder sound than a gentle, small movement. Physical expression, gesture, matches the intensity of the sound. In the digital context, gesture and sound are suddenly decoupled from each other: synthetic sound generation is no longer determined by the force of movement, and is even possible without any contact at all. The eye can no longer predict what the ear hears.

This separation opens up new possibilities for translating movement into sound, for example through motion tracking. The ZiMMT’s 3D audio system makes it possible to hear the movement of sound in space without changing one’s own position. Sens move explores the facets of the new, independent relationship between sound and movement.

26.11. — 03.12.

more infos coming soon

Artists:

  • Thomas Laigle
  • Marc André Weibezahn
  • Luis Kießling
  • tba
  • tba

Opening hours:

Opening reception on November 26 at 6 p.m.

Sunday (November 30) – Wednesday (December 3)
4 p.m. – 8 p.m.

What new possibilities does digital technology offer for influencing sound through movement? How can sensors translate movements into sounds, and what does this mean for the relationship between musical expression and gesture? In workshops and lectures, artists provide detailed insights into their technical developments and aesthetic research on the subject, allowing us to try out our own body movements as instruments.

Workshops

  • Inclusive workshop with Robert Wechsler – November 28 / 1:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m.
  • Sara Létourneau & Chantale Boulianne – November 29 / 2:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.

lectures

  • Stijn Dickel aifoon Chorus of footsteps – November 27 / 5 p.m.
  • Robert Wechsler & Philipp Schmalfuß – November 28 / 6 p.m.
  • Alexander Schubert – November 29 / 6 p.m.

27. — 29.11.

sens move combines 3D audio concerts and dance to create audiovisual, immersive performances. Visible movement can determine sounds, and conversely, audible sounds can be translated into moving images. Acoustic and electronic instruments appear between choreographic and sculptural elements, while self-developed software and devices connect humans and machines directly with each other. Bodies and gestures become compositional elements, and movement and music enter into a new relationship.

Artists:

  • Chantale Boulianne & Sara Létourneau
  • Cosmic Bright 
  • Shasha Chen
  • Sabina Covarrubias
  • Stijn Dickel
  • Jakob Gruhl, Cheetah Dragon, Tomoko Nakasato, Juliane Zöllner
  • Yaand & urbau
  • Max Burstyn, Yongbom Lee, Babett Niclas & Agata Patyczek
  • Clara Sjölin & Paul Hauptmeier

Body, Matter, Sound (Workshop in English, November 29, 3–6 p.m.)

In this workshop, artists Chantale Boulianne and Sara Létourneau invite participants to explore the physical and sensory relationships between body, matter, and sound.
Drawing from their artistic practice, they will guide a series of collective improvisations and explorations involving objects, materials, and musical instruments, in order to discover new ways of listening, moving, and playing together. Participants will be encouraged to experiment with scale and distance, create dialogues between heterogeneous objects, work on transitions, and integrate the artists’ instruments and structures into their own explorations. Each exploration sequence will conclude with short collective presentations, fostering exchange and shared reflection.

Sara Létourneau is a multidisciplinary artist working across visual arts, music, performance, video, and theatre. A hallmark of her practice is its hybridity and her frequent collaborations with other artists, creating works that blur boundaries between disciplines. The performative is central to her approach: through the body in motion, she explores the resonances of sound, gesture, and matter. Her performances often transform space into immersive environments where symbols and mythologies reveal new ways of perceiving the world. Since 2006, she has presented more than a hundred works in museums, galleries, theatres, artist-run centres, and festivals across Canada, the United States, Europe, and Asia. Beyond solo practice, she is also active in collective creations that combine sound, scenography, and physical presence.

Chantale Boulianne is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice revolves around gesture, movement, and the body in action. For more than 25 years, she has explored the body as both a site of testing and a medium of expression, investigating how physical experience shapes identity and perception. With a background in music, she later expanded into visual arts, design, and scenography, developing a language that bridges sound, image, and performance. She has collaborated on more than thirty interdisciplinary stage projects and presented her visual work in exhibitions across Quebec. Whether through performance or installation, Boulianne’s approach consistently places the body at the centre of her artistic inquiry, using it as a resonant instrument to explore the boundaries between inner experience and collective presence.

Foto: Guillaume-Thibert

What Still Whispers (Performance November 27 / 8 p.m.)

What Still Whispers is a 50-minute immersive and installation-based sound performance by Sara Létourneau and Chantale Boulianne. The work explores the resonant meeting points between body, matter, and sound, developed through years of material research and experimentation. On stage, the duo performs with monumental sound-objects and modular structures of their own design, generating powerful and poetic sonic and visual events.
Through gestures of construction and deconstruction, a series of physical tableaux unfolds in which the body itself becomes an instrument. Sonic material is shaped live using resonant constructions, acoustic amplifiers, and subtle digital processing, diffused through an eight-channel loudspeaker system surrounding the audience. The scenography evolves continuously as sculptural elements interlock and reconfigure into shifting architectures, each carrying symbolic and sonic significance.
Texts drawn from personal experience open onto universal questions of transformation, vulnerability, and resilience. They speak of the necessity to rebuild and reimagine our relationship to the world. At once poetic and raw, What Still Whispers reflects on renewal and the fragile balance between destruction and creation — asking how we might listen to what still whispers beneath the surface of change.

Sara Létourneau is a multidisciplinary artist working across visual arts, music, performance, video, and theatre. A hallmark of her practice is its hybridity and her frequent collaborations with other artists, creating works that blur boundaries between disciplines. The performative is central to her approach: through the body in motion, she explores the resonances of sound, gesture, and matter. Her performances often transform space into immersive environments where symbols and mythologies reveal new ways of perceiving the world. Since 2006, she has presented more than a hundred works in museums, galleries, theatres, artist-run centres, and festivals across Canada, the United States, Europe, and Asia. Beyond solo practice, she is also active in collective creations that combine sound, scenography, and physical presence.

Chantale Boulianne is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice revolves around gesture, movement, and the body in action. For more than 25 years, she has explored the body as both a site of testing and a medium of expression, investigating how physical experience shapes identity and perception. With a background in music, she later expanded into visual arts, design, and scenography, developing a language that bridges sound, image, and performance. She has collaborated on more than thirty interdisciplinary stage projects and presented her visual work in exhibitions across Quebec. Whether through performance or installation, Boulianne’s approach consistently places the body at the centre of her artistic inquiry, using it as a resonant instrument to explore the boundaries between inner experience and collective presence.

Foto: Constantin Monfilliette

Hidden Gem (29.11. / 20 Uhr)

Hidden Gem is a five-song suite by Cosmic Bride that unfolds as an immersive concert experience where voice, harp, vibraphone, and electronics move through space like celestial bodies in orbit. Each piece is choreographed to draw listeners into a three-dimensional sound world that blurs the boundaries between performance, installation, and ritual.
Taking its title from Hidden Gem—the world’s first polymetallic-nodules vessel recently refitted in the Port of Rotterdam—the work intertwines the industrial and the mythical. It reflects on humanity’s renewed “gold rush” for rare materials hidden in the depths of the oceans, asking what treasures we seek and what traces we leave behind.
Through intricate vocal textures, resonant metallic timbres, and subtle electronic currents, Cosmic Bride builds a landscape that feels at once intimate and cosmic. “Hidden Gem” invites the audience to move within sound, to listen from shifting perspectives, and to inhabit the fragile space where exploration meets reverence.

Cosmic Bride is the avant-pop project of Lithuanian-born composer, vocalist, and producer Natalja Chareckaja, active in the Dutch performing-arts scene since 2015. Her work merges contemporary classical composition, jazz-inflected harmony, and experimental pop into immersive sonic architectures that explore the relationship between sound and space.
With a background spanning music theatre, performance, and electroacoustic composition, Chareckaja’s practice investigates how voice and movement can sculpt perception and proximity. Under the alias Cosmic Bride, she builds multi-dimensional performances where music becomes both landscape and narrative—an encounter between the planetary and the personal.

Foto: Cveti Zabiela

59°05’13.3 N 78°59’40.4 E (Kinetic sound installation)

During a ten-minute performance, seven organ pipes of varying sizes with sound bodies are immersed in a basin containing 800 litres of water. The immersion takes place randomly, creating constantly changing sound compositions. After ten minutes, the sound bodies return to their starting position. This is followed by a pause, which varies randomly between two and five minutes. Then the process begins again and independently develops another piece. The organ pipes are attached with strings to a ceiling panel, which also supports the visible motors and the rest of the technology. This makes the mechanical elements a recognisable part of the object. The room acoustics are directly influenced by the installation. The sounds of the organ pipes combine with the splashing and movements of the water as well as with the noises of the motors, the strings and their friction.

Luis Kießling was born in Halle (Saale) in 2001. A city in Saxony-Anhalt characterised by structural change, cultural contrasts and a quiet strangeness. Since 2022, he has been studying at Burg Giebichenstein University of Art and Design Halle, currently in the Time-Based Arts class taught by Prof. Michaela Schweiger. His artistic practice focuses on sound, installation and kinetic installations.

Foto: Luis Kießling

Interoception – Translating Bodily Signals into Sound (November 27 / 8 p.m.)

Interoception is the perception of internal bodily processes such as heartbeat, breathing, hunger or inner tension. It significantly influences our emotional experience and self-perception. How well we sense these signals shapes our connection to ourselves – physically, mentally and musically. What we call ‘the world’ begins within us. In Interoception, music and science come together not for illustration, but in a genuine exchange. The musicians reveal their innermost selves in the truest sense of the word. With the help of portable EEG and ECG systems, their brain waves and heart signals are recorded in real time. What otherwise remains hidden and inaudible becomes sound. Pulse and neural impulses determine the tempo and dynamics. The music follows the body – and the body in turn begins to respond. Breathing, tension, concentration: every inner state has audible consequences. Perception is mirrored, amplified, distorted, and the body reacts to what it has produced itself.
Interoception is neither a classical concert nor a scientific experiment – but rather a poetic experiment about what moves us, in the most literal sense. Music that is not only heard, but felt.

Agata Patyczek is a cognitive neuroscientist and violinist. She is pursuing her doctorate at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig and the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin. Her research investigates how signals from the heart interact with brain function. She is a passionate science communicator and brings science and culture closer together.

Babett Niclas is a harpist who develops interdisciplinary projects and new cultural formats. On the harp, she searches for the sound that is truly unique to the instrument and plays both the classical pedal harp and the baroque triple harp. In addition to her ensembles Duo L’Oro, Soundtravelers, Sospiratem and GEM, Babett has worked with Florentina Holzinger, Continuum Berlin and the Lautten Compagney, among others.

Yongbom Lee is a Korean composer and interdisciplinary artist living in Leipzig who combines music, neuroscience and visual art. His works – ranging from instrumental music to electronic music and theatre music – have been performed by the Ensemble Modern and the ORF Radio Symphony Orchestra Vienna, among others. He is a multiple award winner in Europe and teaches at the Leipzig University of Music and Theatre.

Max Burstyn is a master’s graduate of the Royal Academy of Music in London. His interdisciplinary career includes film music composition for Disney, audiovisual software development in neuroscience at UCL, and live electronics at clubs and festivals.

Foto: Shin Joong Kim

Identity Factory (November 28 / 8 p.m.)

Identity Factory is a collaborative project by composer and performer Shasha Chen and visual artist Qingyuan Wang, exploring the virtual-audio performance space as a living organism. In this environment, screens, sound, and live performance elements interact like interdependent “organs,” forming a dynamic and responsive system.
As part of Chen’s ongoing series fe-[mute(male)], the work examines the reproduction, commodification, circulation, and consumption of the female body as a simulacrum. Through performative and audiovisual layers, Identity Factory investigates how gender, identity, and corporeality are shaped and represented within social and systemic structures.
Combining 3D audio, video, and live performative elements, the piece bridges installation and performance art. The visual dimension, created in collaboration with Qingyuan Wang (video) and Lilai Jia (animation), extends the sound into virtual spatial depth, while Chen’s compositional structure invites the audience into a reflective, immersive environment where the body is simultaneously medium, metaphor, and site of transformation.

Shasha Chen is a composer, performer, and multimedia artist whose work merges composition, performance, and interdisciplinary collaboration. Operating within the framework of conceptual (new) music theater, her practice addresses socio-political topics such as identity, gender, power dynamics, patriarchy, social injustice, immigration, and violence.
She is a 2026 DAAD Artists-in-Berlin Fellow, the recipient of the 2025 International Hanns Eisler Scholarship of the City of Leipzig, and a SANE project residency artist hosted by Hellerau and Echo Factory. Chen was awarded the 2024 Presser Music Award and a fellowship at Art Omi Residency.
Her music and performance works have been presented at international festivals and institutions including Wiener Festwochen, TIME:SPANS Festival, MaerzMusik Festival, Forecast Forum, Phoenix Satellite, Hamburg International Music Festival, impuls Festival, and Linecheck Music Meeting & Festival. Her artworks have also been exhibited in museums and galleries worldwide.

Foto: Shasha Chen & Qingyuan Wang

colors in the sky (Panel moderation November 26 / 6 p.m.)

The site-specific installation ‘colours in the sky’ consists of hanging objects whose transparency, colourfulness and organic form are reminiscent of algae, swarms of fish and dances. The movement of the viewers causes the elements to vibrate, subtly changing the composition. The colour gradients give the impression of extraordinary colour phenomena in the sky: sunrise, sunset, rainbows or aurora borealis.

Nora Frohmannlives and works in Leipzig. After studying photography in Munich and fine arts in Leipzig, her artistic practice is based on dance/performance and sculpture/installation. She is interested in potentialities, ambiguities, the body and sensuality. She has received numerous scholarships and her work is exhibited internationally. She has been a member of the Leipzig Dance Theatre company since 2017 and has been its artistic assistant since 2019. She works(ed) with/for various choreographers and artists. Since 2020, she has been part of the Leipzig feedback initiative ‘you are warmly invited’. Another of her many fields of activity is art education.

Foto: Nora Frohmann

A Chorus of Footsteps (November 28 / 5 p.m.)

A Chorus of Footsteps is a collective listening walk that explores how our individual and shared movements shape the soundscape around us. Every step, surface and rhythm becomes part of a composition in motion — created not by one artist, but by all who listen and move together. The walk, developed by Stijn Dickel of aifoon, invites participants to experience walking as an auditory, spatial and social act. Listening becomes a form of choreography: a way of sensing and re-imagining the world through sound. Each participant becomes both observer and performer, discovering that to walk is to compose, and to listen is to belong, not only to a place, but to the long continuum of sound that connects all places and times.

Stijn Dickel studied philosophy and mixed media and began his artistic path as a performer and musician with Jan Fabre/Troubleyn in Je suis sang. He soon developed sound compositions and listening concepts for dance, theatre, circus, and documentary, and later collaborated as a musician with ensembles such as Kaboom Karavan and Inwolves.
For more than twenty years, he has been the artistic director of aifoon, a nomadic arts organisation dedicated to listening as a critical and co-creative practice. His artistic work unfolds at the crossroads of the choreography of sound and the scenography of listening. Through participatory projects in public space, he explores how listening can shape social, cultural, and urban dialogue.
Fascinated by the sounds we mentally and physically carry, he has created works such as Watch Out!, Watch In!, A glimpse of where we’re going and Murmur, in which carrying sound and stretching the act of listening are central. With A Chorus of Footsteps and the in-house sound system De Zwerm, he continues his research into sound identity and auditory territory.

Foto: Stijn Dickel

Lecture (November 27 / 5 p.m.)

In this lecture, participants are invited to reconsider listening as an active and co-creative process that shapes the ways in which people live together. Stijn Dickel introduces Aifoon’s artistic practice, drawing on stories, sound fragments, and participatory projects — ranging from soundwalks and circus performances to The Swarm, a moving orchestra of twenty wireless speakers. Through these examples, the lecture illustrates how listening can transform perception, relationships, and even urban spaces. A live demonstration of The Swarm allows participants to experience how this instrument creates immersive, spatial listening environments, turning everyday surroundings into shared spaces of encounter. The session reveals how this unique system evolved from an artistic necessity into a versatile tool for workshops, installations, performances, and listening walks.

Stijn Dickel studied philosophy and mixed media and began his artistic path as a performer and musician with Jan Fabre/Troubleyn in Je suis sang. He soon developed sound compositions and listening concepts for dance, theatre, circus, and documentary, and later collaborated as a musician with ensembles such as Kaboom Karavan and Inwolves.
For more than twenty years, he has been the artistic director of aifoon, a nomadic arts organisation dedicated to listening as a critical and co-creative practice. His artistic work unfolds at the crossroads of the choreography of sound and the scenography of listening. Through participatory projects in public space, he explores how listening can shape social, cultural, and urban dialogue.
Fascinated by the sounds we mentally and physically carry, he has created works such as Watch Out!, Watch In!, A glimpse of where we’re going and Murmur, in which carrying sound and stretching the act of listening are central. With A Chorus of Footsteps and the in-house sound system De Zwerm, he continues his research into sound identity and auditory territory.

Foto: Tom Cornille

Konzert (26.11. / 19 Uhr)

Sabina Covarrubias presents an audiovisual performance that investigates real-time visual representations of music. Through custom-built tools and interactive systems, she translates the energy and structure of sound into dynamic moving images, allowing audiences to perceive musical interaction simultaneously through hearing and sight.
At the core of the performance lies Covarrubias’ self-developed software Synesthetic Devices, an environment designed for Ableton Live that synchronizes generative video with live sound synthesis. Modular synthesizers, voice processors, and real-time animation engines are connected in a single system, where both sonic and visual layers influence each other. The performance unfolds as an evolving dialogue between sound and image, in which color, rhythm, and texture become shared parameters.
Combining artistic intuition with technical precision, Sabinas performance highlights the visual dimension of musical experience. It reveals patterns and structures hidden within sound, transforming the concert into an immersive sensory environment that bridges perception, technology, and emotion.

Sabina Covarrubias, PhD, is a composer, multimedia artist, and software developer whose work explores the intersection of music and visuals. She is the founder of Synesthetic Devices, a series of visual music instruments for Ableton Live, and creates real-time audiovisual performances using modular synthesizers, voice processors, and generative video engines.
Her artistic practice spans visual music, electroacoustic and experimental electronic music, musique mixte, and symphonic composition. She has performed at international venues and festivals such as Tate Modern (London), Vision’R (Paris), Sonica (Glasgow), Saturnalia (Milan), Keroxen (Tenerife), Mercat de Música Viva (Vic), Improtech (Uzeste), Performing Media Festival (Indiana), and Festival de l’Imaginaire (Paris).
A recipient of Mexico’s SNCA grant, Covarrubias holds a PhD from Paris 8, has taught at Sorbonne University and Paris 8, and worked at IRCAM, developing AI-driven music visualization tools that bridge artistic creativity and scientific research.

Foto: Bernard Bousquet

Everyday Dystopia (November 28 / 8 p.m.)

The performance combines elements of interactive reading, performance and concert. It addresses dystopias of everyday life, observations and connections between people – online, offline and in between. A key stylistic device is the tracking of performers Tomoko Nakasato and Juliane Zöllner. Their movements and positions in space interpret the soundscapes of Jakob Gruhl and the electronic pieces by Cheetah Dragon.

Juliane Zöllner was born in Dresden in 1981. She initiated theatre and performance projects while still a student and completed a master’s degree in literary writing at the Leipzig Institute for Literature. Since then, she has been working as a freelance author and is part of the Leipzig Contact Scene. Most recently, she presented Sophie Steinbeck’s text “ Mein Geliebter ” in a staged reading with Sébastien Branche and Franz Sodann in the theatre garden of the Neues Schauspiel.

Tomoko Nakasato from Japan began hip-hop street dance in the 1990s and combines this experience with contemporary dance techniques. She has been living and working in Berlin since 2008. From 2011 to the present, she has collaborated internationally with artists such as Ilpo Väisänen (Pan sonic, the Angel), Jochen Arbeit (Einstürzende Neubauten), Damo Suzuki (Ex-Can) and Frank Bretschneider (Raster-Noton).

Cheetah Dragon, alias Stephan Kloß, is a musician, media artist and developer. He studied multimedia design at Burg in Halle and researched and developed multisensory musical experiences. He received the ZKM App Art Award for his work ‘Mazetools Soniface’. As a musician, he works with tools he has developed himself and releases electronic R&B with hyperpop elements under the pseudonym Cheetah Dragon.

Jakob Gruhl is a museologist, musician and Sorbian artist. He is co-developer of the software tools ‘Sonic Moves’ and ‘Mazetools’, which combine multisensory approaches with artistic and musical forms of expression, in particular through motion tracking. As an artist, he works under the name jkube (dʒeɪ kuːb) in the fields of ambient, techno and electronica.

Foto: Nina Buttendorf

The MotionComposer (Workshop November 28 / 2 p.m.)

MotionComposer is an interactive music device that transforms movement into sound. Developed by Robert Wechsler, Philipp Schmalfuss, and collaborators, the project aims to make the joy and health benefits of music creation accessible to people of all physical and cognitive abilities. The MotionComposer team is based in Weimar and Chemnitz, Germany.
Choreographer and dancer Robert Wechsler is a pioneer in interactive tools and performance technologies. After studying with Merce Cunningham and John Cage in New York, he founded Palindrome, a dance company dedicated to exploring the intersection of movement and digital art.
Composer Philipp Schmalfuss, a former Bauhaus University student, specializes in the use of PureData software and developed many of the musical environments now integrated into the MotionComposer.

The MotionComposer is an interactive dance–music system that translates movement into sound. Designed to empower people of all abilities to create music through motion, it transforms the smallest gesture into an expressive sonic event. Developed by Robert Wechsler, Philipp Schmalfuss, and their team, the device opens new creative possibilities for dancers, musicians, and anyone curious about the connection between body and sound.
In this live demo and workshop, participants are invited to experience the MotionComposer firsthand. Using a combination of motion sensors and real-time sound synthesis, the system responds to posture, rhythm, and flow—allowing movement to become music.
The session introduces the latest features of the MotionComposer and explores its use in inclusive art, therapy, and education. By bridging technology and human expression, it reveals how accessible design can unlock new dimensions of creativity and shared experience.

Lecture (November 28 / 6 p.m.)

The lecture offers an introduction to MotionComposer, an interactive dance-music system that translates movement into sound. Developed by Robert Wechsler, Philipp Schmalfuss and their team, the instrument enables music to be created through movement – from the subtlest gestures to dynamic body sequences. During the lecture, participants will learn how MotionComposer uses motion sensors and real-time sound synthesis to respond to posture, rhythm and movement flow, transforming them into expressive soundscapes. The lecture also highlights the technical and musical approaches behind the system – from synthesiser engines to the principles of music programming – that enable physical gestures to be translated into audible forms of expression.

Foto:  Uwe Meinhold

MOVING OUT LOUD (November 30, 1–4 p.m.)

MOVING OUT LOUD is an experience of dance without the sense of sight. In small groups, with eyes closed, the audience finds itself in the middle of the stage, immersed in a sonically playful landscape of descriptive voices and moving bodies. Developed together with blind and sighted dancers, the performance artistically deals with (self-)audio description and the potential empathic resonance in the acoustic perception of dance.

The encounter between different protagonists, voices and bodies offers a playful examination of the question of how movement can be experienced beyond the visual aspect of dance. Amid audible stage presence of the dancers, and without visual reference, the audience is presented with a very individual idea of dance and body perception. Starting with blind ballet dancer Krishna Washburn’s teaching method of self-audio description in her online Dark Room Ballet workshops, Britt Hatzius explored the acoustic potential of a non-visual sensation of dance in her research together with blind performer Pernille Sonne, blind singer Gerlinde Sämann, sighted dancers Cecilia Ponteprimo and Livia Vogt, and dancers from the Dresden-Frankfurt-Dance-Company. With this performance, she makes this shared exploration accessible to a sighted and non-sighted audience through the immersive sound installation OTTOsonics.

Britt Hatzius, born in Chiclayo, Peru, in 1978, works with film, video, sound, and performance. She studied media and fine arts at Chelsea College of Arts London and sociology at Goldsmiths University of London. Her work focuses primarily on moving image formats that explore the interpretation of language and the associated potential for miscommunication. She is part of the Not Applicable collective and the non-profit organization Vision Inclusive.

Der Workshop ist ein Konzept von Britt Hatzius, entwickelt in enger Zusammenarbeit mit den Tänzer*innen Krishna Washburn, Pernille Sonne, Cecilia Ponteprimo, Gerlinde Sämann, Livia Vogt, Lorenzo Ponteprimo, Georgia Begbie und der Dresden Frankfurt Dance Company unter der künstlerischen Leitung von Ioannis Mandafounis. Dramaturgie: Charlotte Arens. Outside Ear: Melanie Hambrecht, Lenka Löhmann, Sanatha Hannig und Thomas Tajo. Ton und Soundbearbeitung: Britt Hatzius, Felix Deufel und Rupert Jaud. Ambisonic-Tontechnik (OTTOsonics): Manu Mitterhuber. Künstlerische Produktion: Katja Timmerberg. Koproduziert von Theater Rampe e.V. Stuttgart mit Unterstützung der Schwankhalle Bremen und des EinTanzHaus e.V. Mannheim. Ermöglicht durch die Projektförderung des Landesverbands Freie Tanz- und Theaterschaffende Baden-Württemberg (LaFT BW) e.V., gefördert vom Ministerium für Wissenschaft, Forschung und Kunst Baden-Württemberg. Zusätzlich unterstützt vom Fonds Darstellende Künste aus Mitteln der Beauftragten der Bundesregierung für Kultur und Medien.

Foto: Dominique Brewing

String Theory 2 (November 29 / 8 p.m.)

For one dancer, 3D sound, lasers, position tracking, motion capture, capacitive touch sensors, metal strings, and Max/MSP.

String Theory 2 is an interactive musical ecosystem composed by Paul Hauptmeier and performed by dancer Clara Sjölin. The piece is structured in multiple musical situations or landscapes, in which the dancer uses her position, movement, and gestural interaction with lasers and metal strings to explore the musical possibilities of the system in real time, while also responding to the composition she is co-creating.
The result is a complex feedback loop between the dancer’s agency, the openness and constraints of the musical system, improvisational responses, and the audiovisual result experienced by the audience.

Paul Hauptmeier is a composer and multimedia artist based in Leipzig. He studied composition in Weimar and in San Diego, California. Since 2009 he works as part of the artist duo Hauptmeier|Recker in the field of composition, sound and multimedia art. Paul is a founding member of the ZiMMT in Leipzig, where he conducts research in the field of spatial audio and augmented reality in the field of sound and multimedia art and organises workshops, panels, concerts and exhibitions on the subject. His works have been presented in festivals and institutions like: Sharjah Biennial, Istanbul Biennial, Venice Biennial, Venice Biennale Musica, Festspielhaus Hellerau, Ses Dotze Naus Ibiza, EMAF

Clara Sjölin is a dance artist from Sweden who works in various local contexts in Leipzig in the field of choreography and dance pedagogy. Clara’s recurring choreographic themes explore forms of social togetherness, liberation as a collective and individual manifestation and the revival of historical events. She choreographs for the stage and outdoors in public spaces, for groups and her own solo works. Since 2024 Clara is the artistic director of the youth dance company (Juniorcompany der Älteren) at Leipziger Tanztheater.​

Foto: Matthias Gruner

Concrete Fields (November 29 / 8 p.m.)

Berlin-based artists Anda Kryeziu (YAAND) and Justin Robinson (Urbau) present Concrete Fields, a collaborative sound project fusing industrial noise, hyperpop aesthetics and spatialised audio design.
Field recordings captured in Kosovo and Brandenburg lie at the core of the work, and are transformed through a combination of digital and semi-analogue processing techniques. The result is a vivid sonic dialogue between the organic and the hyper-synthetic — a tension that unfolds through rhythmically intricate structures and glitch-infused textures.
Using a combination of field recordings, voice, electromagnetic and lavalier microphones, digital synths and samplers, the artists create immersive soundscapes that blur the boundaries between rural and industrial, natural and mechanical, and intimate and architectural.
Concrete Fields is performed in a live spatial audio context and explores the shifting terrain where human presence, technology and environment collide — reflecting on how sound inhabits space and how, in turn, space shapes our perception of sound.

Anda Kryeziu (YAAND), Born in Kosovo and currently based in Berlin, Anda Kryeziu (YAAND) is an experimental artist, producer, composer and performer who fuses distinctive contemporary compositions with the aesthetics of hyperpop and electronica. Heavy on the glitch and not afraid to disarm with discordance, YAAND has seen her music performed at various festivals, including ECLAT Festival, Munich Biennale, Darmstädter Ferienkurse, November Music, Warsaw Autumn, Dokufest, Klangspuren Schwaz etc. She has also received several scholarships and prizes, including the 69th Composition Prize of the City of Stuttgart 2024, the Prize of Contemporary Arts Alliance Berlin, and the Akademie Musik Theater Heute of the Deutsche Bank Foundation.

The work of Berlin-based media composer, audiovisual artist and educator Justin Robinson spans compositions for chamber music and orchestra, having been shown at the Venice Biennale and Ars Electronica, among others. However, as urbau, he concentrates on the intersection of industrial soundscapes and noise. Through the intensive processing of acoustic sources and electronic synthesis, his audiovisual performances build architectures of sound and responsive visuals that examine the relationship between industrial decay and digital abstraction. In turn, we are rewarded with delirious distortion and meditative compositions gloriously smashing into one another, urbau seamlessly combining the digital with the material.

Foto: Gael Delpero

Luciférine

Luciférine is a sculptural sound installation for bioluminescent bacteria. Its name refers to luciferin, the molecule that makes natural light possible. In complete darkness, a group of humans witnesses the journey of these luminous microorganisms as they travel through a transparent glass sculpture-instrument.
As the glowing liquid circulates, it reveals the shifting form of a chimerical being while triggering layers of sound through embedded sensors. The sculpture becomes a living interface — a playground for bacteria — where movement and oxygen feed the bioluminescent process.
With Luciférine, Thomas Laigle offers an immersive and contemplative encounter with the origins of light and life itself. Combining sound art, sculpture, and microbiological collaboration, the work transforms scientific phenomena into sensory experience: a motionless voyage to the abyss, where technology and the living world merge in slow, hypnotic radiance.

Thomas Laigle is a sound and visual artist based between Berlin and France. Through a transdisciplinary practice, he explores the interplay between natural phenomena, technology, and living organisms. In his works, light and sound are often intertwined to the point of becoming a single entity.
Guided by an art–science approach, Laigle collaborates with specialists in fields such as entomology, microbiology, and oceanology. These exchanges give rise to works that heighten our perception of life and its hidden interconnections. His creations—sound sculptures, installations, interactive devices—embrace a low-tech approach that balances sensory immersion, ecological awareness, and aesthetics.

Foto: Romain Charrier

Gestural Interfaces (Lecture November 29 / 6 p.m.)

In his lecture ‘Gestural Interfaces,’ Alexander Schubert examines the relationship between physical movement and musical expression in the context of contemporary composition and live electronics. Based on his artistic research and teaching at the Hamburg University of Music and Theatre, he discusses how gestures can function both as compositional tools and as interfaces for expression.
Using examples from his own artistic practice, Schubert analyses how sensors, motion data and interactive systems translate human gestures into sound, thereby creating hybrid forms between performance, technology and physicality. The lecture provides insight into compositional strategies, technical setups and aesthetic considerations that arise when the performer’s body itself becomes part of the musical system.
The lecture combines theoretical reflection with practical approaches and shows how new technologies can redefine musical authorship, performative identity and perception in contemporary music theatre.

Alexander Schubert (1979) studied bioinformatics, multimedia composition. He’s a professor at the Musikhochschule Hamburg. Schubert’s interest explores the border between the acoustic and electronic world. In music composition, immersive installation and staged pieces he examines the interplay between the digital and the analogue. He creates pieces that realize test settings or interaction spaces that question modes of perception and representation. Continuing topics in this field are authenticity and virtuality. The influence and framing of digital media on aesthetic views and communication is researched in a post-digital perspective. Recent research topics in his works were virtual reality, artificial intelligence and online-mediated artworks. Schubert is a founding member of ensembles such as “Decoder“. His works have been performed more than 700 times in the last few years by numerous ensembles in over 30 countries.

Foto: Alexander Schubert

AQOO

AQOO is a simple space with a structure of varying complexity. Orientation becomes both a challenge and an opportunity. Sonic impressions guide and confuse, spaces open up and soon disappear again. Nothing is located in AQOO. It is an immaterial and changeable sound installation that reacts dynamically to visitors. By minimising visual stimuli, attention is directed to a sound environment that can be interacted with through movement and positioning. In this way, numerous, sometimes overlapping narrative and abstract levels can be uncovered and interpreted individually. Both the synthesis and representation of the soundscape are spatially arranged.

Marc-André Weibezahn is a designer, media artist, and developer whose work moves between code, sound, and motion. He creates custom software as both a tool and a medium, intertwining technology with artistic exploration. His pieces often exist purely in the digital realm — as living code or fleeting media — yet at times they materialize as tangible objects or spatial installations. In recent years, his practice has turned almost entirely toward experimental sound and movement, leading to the creation of several unique applications. Since 2023, Marc-André has been the co-founder, developer, and designer of Sonic Moves, a body-interactive audio software that transforms motion into sound. Since 2020, he lives in Leipzig.

Foto: Mahshid Mahboubifar

DJ Set (26.11.)

With numerous pseudonyms and projects such as a radio show and the free party collective ‘selected defected’, OYZ covers a broad musical spectrum that goes far beyond dance music or listening. As someone who feels particularly free on the dance floor, it is precisely this feeling of (musical) freedom that can be expected.

Zyo works collectively at Hitness Club e.V. and at the New European Bauhaus in Zeitz, as well as in the structural change taking place in central Germany – the latter often reinterpreted musically for the occasion.

Foto: 

A production by ZiMMT e.V. 2025
Curation: Paul Hauptmeier
Design: Klara Spunk
Website: Nina Buttendorf
Text: Tabea Köbler, Marie Kollek

Newsletter

Newsletter

Artist List

Aii Wijayanti Anik
Aliya Sayfart
Amoenus
Andreas Nordheim
Andreas Ullrich
Andreas Wannerstedt
Anna Schimkat
Antje Meichsner
Artes Mobiles
Birk Schmithüsen
Bertolt Meyer
Brigitta Muntendorf
burgund t brandt
Ca$$andra
Chiara Stuto
Christof Schlager
Claudia Schwarz
Cleo Doelling
Crys Cole
Cucina Povera
Damián Gorandi
Daniel Wilmers
Dasniya Sommer
David Simmons
Denim Szram
Diana Syrse Valdes
dotzerosix
Ectoplastic
Elisa Batti
EMIKA
Enrique Tomás
eNμ
Ensemble 23
Ensemble Polli Morph
Fabian Raith
Felice & The Frameworker
Felix Deufel
Felix Leffranks
Frederike Moormann
Geräuschkulisse
Gerriet K. Sharma
Grace Boyle + Antoine Bertin
Hanno Leichtmann
Hauptmeier | Recker
Helga Hagen
Henrik Rohde
hitness.club
HMT Leipzig
Ida Bux
Ikbal Lybus
Ioana Vreme Moser
Iulja Smeu
Jacopo Cenni
Jakob Gruhl
Jana Irmert
Jasmina Rezig
Jasha Hagen
Jason Langheim
Jeffrey Döring
Jessica Ekomane
Jiyoung Chloe Yoon
Johannes Schütz
John Burnett
Julia Kiehlmann
Julian Charrière
Juliane Kowalke
Jules Reidy
Judith Crasser
Katharina Bévand
Kerstin Ergenzinger
Kilian Ernst
Klara Ravat
Klara Spunk
Kollektiv WERT
Kollektiv:Koeln
Konstantin Fontaine
Krachim
Lange/Berweck/Lorenz
La Pesch
Leaf Audio
Leon Goltermann
Leonie Strecker
LiLe
Lina Orlando
Loewe Immerlieb
LOUFR
Lucas Gutierrez
Ludwig Berger
Luise Wonneberger
Louis Dufort
Louise Rossiter
mʊdʌki
Manu Mitterhuber
Marcus Schmickler
Marja Ahti
Maria Wildeis
Mariam Gviniashvili
Marie Luise Möller
Martí Guillem
Martin Recker
Maxim M. Chubarov
Maxi Pongratz
Michael Akstaller
Michael v. zur Mühlen
Michaela Pňačeková
Mia Gara
Mortiz Simon Geist
Natasha Barrett
Nani Cooper
Nicolás Rupcich
Nikhil Nagaraj
Oscar Friisgaard
Panayiotis Kokoras
Paula Ábalos
Patrícia Pinheiro
Patrick Franke
Patrick Loos
Passion Asanu & Cosmo Schüppel
Paul Hauptmeier
Passepartout Duo
Perila
Philipp Rumsch
Portrait XO
Prof. Charles Spence
Prof. Ercan Altinsoy
Prof. Thomas Hummel
Quast
Rashad Becker
Rian Treanor
Riddle
Robert Lippok
Robert Normandeau
Robertina Šebjanič
Robin Minard
Sabine Lippold
Saou TV
Sara Persico
Scriabin Code Ensemble
Sébastien Branche
Simon Schäfer
Solaris
Sofia Zaiceva
Sofie Neu
Sophia Amelia Eickhoff
Sphere Radio
Stephanie Felber
Stephan Kloß
Narr/Steidle
Studio Aabove&Below
Studio Tutti und Twikx e.V.
Sub_Bar
Tasneem Lohani
Theresa Rothe
Thomas Ankersmit
TIBSLC
Tomoko Nakasato
UN-Sync Ensemble
Viti-Ko Lilja Schell
Victor Mazon Gardoqui
Valerio Tricoli
Viola Yip
Werkbühne
Whispers Red
Wiete Sommer mit Cryptoheroes
Wolfgang Georgsdorf
X. LEE
YAAND & urbau
ZIXP

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