Olivia Louvel

My work is presented in the form of sound recordings, sound art installations, video art and live performances.

As a PhD candidate, I am investigating the interplay of voice and sculpture to significantly establish their intrinsic relationship.

Through practice-based research, I am testing three modes of interplay between voice and sculpture: (1) metamorphosing my voice into sculpture with 3D printing - VoiceScapes; (2) a symbiotic relationship in a voice relief consisting of wall-mounted Visaton speakers; and (3) exploring an acoustic relationship with the site-specific sound sculpture for voice Tvisöngur in remote Iceland.

The aim is to demonstrate how voice and sculpture a priori two opposite entities are interlinked and interdependent through manyfold cooperative and mutualistic relationships, and how this partnership dates to ancient times underpinned by the phenomena of speaking statues. In my search I hope to identify a materialist and agentive voice, a voice I can touch as much as it touches me: a concrete voice.

I have been awarded a travel and research grant by the Henry Moore Foundation to investigate Lukas Kühne' s sound sculpture in Seyðisfjörður, Iceland, hosted by the Skaftfell Visual Art Center's artist residency programme.

Research outputs include: ‘A generative sound mural: The Whole Inside. Sounding the body’ published in Leonardo Music Journal, MIT Press p.29-32 (2020); ‘The Whole Inside’ published in ‘Future Now, Aesthetica Art Prize 2021: 125 contemporary artists’, pp.148-149 (2021); ‘The Sculptor Speaks’, a broadcast on Resonance Extra and an audio-visual installation at The Hepworth Wakefield (2021); 'Doggerland Channels', a sound art installation at Phoenix Art Space (2022) for Sound Art Brighton, and re-installed at Middlesbrough Art Week (2023);  'LOL' a site-specific sonic intervention at Middlesbrough Art Weekender 2022; 'The Sculptor Speaks', exhibited at Towner Gallery (2023); 'doggerLANDscape' broadcast on Late Junction/BBC Radio 3 (2023).

Awards include: an Ivor Novello Award Best Sound Art at the Ivors Classical Awards 2023 for 'LOL', a selection for the Longlist at the Aesthetica Art Prize 2021 for 'The Whole Inside', a nomination Best Sound Art at the Ivors Composer Awards 2020 for 'The Sculptor Speaks'.