Olivia Louvel

As a doctoral researcher at the University of Brighton, I investigate the relationship between voice and sculpture across the Fine Art and Digital Music & Sound Arts departments. 

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 [author]: 'Baschet’s Voice Leaf: The voice wrapped in the sculptural leaf' (Organised Sounds, Cambridge University Press, 2025); 'Lukas Kühne’s Tvísöngur: Sculpture for a Concrete, Uncompressed Voice' (Divergence Press, University of Huddersfield, 2024); ‘The Whole Inside’ (Future Now, Aesthetica Art Prize 2021: 125 contemporary artists’, 2021); ‘A generative sound mural: The Whole Inside. Sounding the body’ (Leonardo Music Journal, The MIT Press, 2020).

Research outputs [practitioner]: 'doggerLANDscape' broadcast on Late Junction/BBC Radio 3 (2023), shown at Towner Cinema, Towner Eastbourne (2024) and at APT Gallery London (2025); 'LOL' a site-specific sonic intervention delivered through the public address system of Middlesbrough’s CCTV surveillance network at Middlesbrough Art Weekender 2022; 'Doggerland Channels', a sound art installation at Phoenix Art Space (2022) for Sound Art Brighton, and re-installed at Middlesbrough Art Week (2023); ‘The Sculptor Speaks’, a broadcast on Resonance Extra and an audio-visual installation at The Hepworth Wakefield (2021) and at Towner Eastbourne (2023).

Awards: Ivor Novello Award Best Sound Art at the Ivors Classical Awards 2023 for 'LOL', a sonic intervention delivered through the public address system of Middlesbrough’s CCTV surveillance network; 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'; a Qwartz Album Award at the Qwartz Electronic Music Awards 2011.