Through the act of play, LiberAiya confronts visitors with a core challenge of liberal societies: sustaining communication among the unfamiliar and the oppositional.
A collaboration between the German-Australian pianist and composer Max Petersen’s LiberA ensemble and the American transdisciplinary artist Melody Chua’s AIYA improvisation machine, LiberAiya takes the form of an interactive installation and a set of performances.
In the installation, visitors are invited to explore and play with a musical improvisation machine created by Chua, called AIYA. The work considers playing with the improvisation machine as a way of engaging with the unfamiliar and the “othered.” What do we do if AIYA confronts us with the uncomfortable and oppositional? Instead of shutting down, do we have the capacity to continue the dialogue? How can we adapt to new ways of expression, where one is not suppressed by the other?
By interacting with AIYA, indeterminate narratives are told through video footage of protests from around the world and from different political positions, recognizing that holding space for opposing views of social change is vital for a pluralistic society. The footage, paired with texts selected and composed by the artists, offer varied glimpses into the possibilities of peaceful protest, tolerance, and expression beyond reactionism. Not only raising fists, but also holding hands.
In the evenings, performances with the AIYA improvisation machine and members of Petersen’s LiberA ensemble will take place.
Installation times:
March 8th 12:00-18:00 @Les Complices*
March 9th 10:30-14:30 @Les Complices*
Performances:
March 8th 18:30 @Les Complices*
18:30 Fabian Arends (percussion) + AIYA
20:00 Song Yi Jeon (vocals) + AIYA
Anwandstrasse 9
8004, Zürich
Max Petersen
(b. 1994, Australia, based in Winterthur) is a German-Australian composer-pianist working in Switzerland. His works, rooted in modern jazz, form a confluence with contemporary Western arts music. This is highlighted on his most recent album release LiberA (2021), in which a rhythm section, chamber music, electronics and voice set a post-genre tone.
Earlier in his career he released four albums mostly for a jazz-trio ensemble with which he toured around Europe regularly. The 2016 release Dream Dancing was praised by the German Newspaper FAZ as an “accolade to the top-league of jazz”.
Today Max engages with artists from multiple disciplines including dance, animation and multimedia. He studied music at conservatories in Zurich, Basel, Lugano and New York, and is currently active as a performer, composer, educator and researcher.
max-petersen.com
Melo Chua
(b. 1994, USA, based in Zürich/Winterthur): transdisciplinary performance artist; classically trained as a flutist before finding her identity in creating performances and installation works with sensor-augmented instruments and bodies, future-fiction sound- and visualscapes, and self-created improvisation machines with AI.
Through the language of new technologies, Melo’s artistic practice continuously asks, “How can we give voices to the ‘othered’ and give form to the invisible? How do we navigate the delicate borderlands where we are not only sovereign entities but also vulnerable extensions of each other? How can we be moved out of our comfort zones to say what really matters?”
Melo’s work can be seen in both institutional and underground contexts across Europe and the U.S. Her collaborations include: STUDIO ZYKLOS (as co-founder; 2 humans & 2 improvisation machines), River Oracle (artist collective), Jaira Peyer (dance & sensors), elea Foundation for Ethics in Globalization (in systems engineering & AI research), ZHdK Immersive Arts Space & Kunstuniversität Graz (as [resident] PhD candidate).
