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‘Unheard and Unseen - Listening on the Margins’ (2020-2021)

A research-based sound-art piece and exhibition as part of the ‘Sound of our Cities’ Creative Europe project between Barcelona (Spain) and Roeselare (Belgium).

Zsófia Szonja Illés’s soundscape project explores the margins of a city and a neighbourhood on the periphery through sound and the narrative of unseen, hidden, and unheard voices. These voices in her work include those on the spatial, social and environmental margins. Invisibility and silence are being explored through the layering of these three narratives: through environmental sound recordings, interviews and the artist’s own narration and reflection.

Female narratives appear in the soundscape through the artist’s conversation with feminist urban designers. The perspectives of those living on the literal and social margins of the city are presented through interviews with social workers, while other-than-human voices speak the powerful metaphors of cohabitation, and translate what a horizontal society might feel like into a sounding experience.

The artist draws parallels between the unconscious, underlying currents of the human psyche and the hidden narratives of the city. Her work asks the important question of whether - instead of the ethically questionable attempts of ‘giving voice’ - the unconscious of the city could be explored and understood through practices of listening and empathy building. Her sound piece also inspires this kind of listening.

The work can be enjoyed in different ways - through listening only, through watching and listening, or with the additional layer of textual narration (subtitles) - to create space for listening to happen before conceptualisation taking place. To allow us to first ‘feel on our own skin what it means to dwell on the margins.

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Interview about my 'Unheard and Unseen' project by ‘Sound of Our Cities’  (Sant Andreu, Barcelona)

SOC: How would you describe the area Sant Andreu?

ZSI: I am only entitled to give a description from the point of view of a visitor. That is necessarily a superficial experience at first. Your attention is on 'the different', on 'the exotic': orange trees in blossom, parrots bickering, the high number of pedestrian areas and the liveliness of the streets. I have been thinking a lot about this while I was spending my residency there. These are zones of comfort that you wouldn't otherwise leave - if it wasn't for someone else to direct your attention to marginal, 'unseen' areas. Marginal in the literal - areas on the margin of the neighbourhood and the city - and the social sense. Regardless of whether you are a tourist or a local, you need to make a conscious decision to engage with the marginal. This is true for most places. It is uncomfortable. In Sant Andreu I decided to explore and map the literal margins of the neighbourhood. And once I did that, it opened up a whole lot more layered and complex reality about the place. With help from local experts, I have explored the areas of Baró de Viver and Bon Pastor in particular. I was intrigued by the often quite hostile architecture and by seeing forms of life thriving there regardless. Click below to continue reading

SOC: What have been your strongest impressions during the residence?

ZSI: As a visitor, strong impressions have been linked to the liveliness of public spaces and the blurred lines between public and private space.

As a placemaker / urban designer, having the possibility to experience some of Barcelona that has been designed from a feminist perspective and to talk to feminist urban planners and designers (Ethel Baraona Pohl and Colectivo Punt 6) has been absolutely inspiring.

And as an artist/researcher exploring the margins of Sant Andreu, and having local experts to guide me around, has added those layers of richness and meaning to the place and helped me to better understanding the complexity of it through the architectural, geographical, social, cultural and environmental/natural entanglements.

SOC: How was it to work in the area during the pandemic?

ZSI: The experience of places is primarily sensory and situated. Most of my work has been engaging with this sensory notion during the past 8 years. It has therefore been amazing to have been given the chance to physically engage with the context. Doing place-based work in situ makes an immense difference, adds so much richness and realness to the work.

During the pandemic, most of us - artists, designers, architects - have experienced a huge disconnect from the places and communities that we work with. This disconnect can be challenging mentally as well as creatively and favours preconceived notions and hypothesis rather than experience-based knowledge of the context. We also started to work online on this project in 2020: having a couple of online discussions with a group of women from Baró de Viver.

However due to unforeseen factors (working during a pandemic), the whole 'fieldwork' had to change while I was there: I couldn't engage with the group of women how it was previously planned, but instead had the opportunity to explore the female voice through interviews with feminist urban designers. This allowed for working in an 'emergent' way: being present for what actually emerged and was happening in Sant Andreu.

SOC: Could you give us an idea about what we can expect from your contribution to the final exhibition?

ZSI: I have explored and mapped the physical margins of the neighbourhood with a particular focus on things that thrive and grow on the margins without much human intervention: celebrating forms of life that otherwise don't get that much attention. Very often these marginal forms of life stay invisible - yet audible. The raw material I have right now includes videos, photographs, sound recordings (soundscapes) and interviews. The final piece of work will most likely take the shape of a narrated video, composed with the images, video and sound I recorded in Sant Andreu, and with the intent to inspire practices of listening to the 'Unseen and Unheard'. I am hoping that by staying with these experiences (the 'uncomfortable', the 'insignificant', the unheard, the invisible) we can learn to foster empathy.

Photos have been taken during my residency (2021 May) in Baro de Viver and Bom Pastor.

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SENSORY MAPPING FOR DIVERSITY IN LAND ENGAGEMENT MDes project and research at The Glasgow School of Art, Design Innovation and Environmental Design (2020) Decisions about the use of Vacant and Derelict Land should be made with those who are the most affected. My MDes project proposes a methodological innovation (Sensory Apprach and Sensory Mapping) for public engagement, that aims at engaging diverse and marginalised communities in land-decisionmaking.   (Click below to Keep reading)

How does your City feel, look, smell and sound? What does your neighbourhood look like? And how do the streets look like in your home country? What do the signs, colours and shapes tell you? Are they welcoming? Do the trees cast long shadows on the pavement of your neighbourhood? And do the roofs glow in orange while catching the late summer sunset? Are there also dark streets and corners in your neighbourhood? Do you ever go there? What is your favourite thing to watch and contemplate in your neighbourhood? Is that the boys playing cricket, the seagulls on the roof, or the magnificent canopies in the park? Does your neighbourhood have a lot of colours? If it was a colouring book how would you colour it for yourself?What are the textures and shapes that feel inviting in your neighbourhood? Those that you cannot resist not to touch - like silky moss growing on old stone walls, that old shiny copper door handle or the soft timber surface of the benches in the park? Are there things you would secretly like to hug on your street, or somewhere you would lay down if nobody watched? Are there also shapes and materials that feel hostile? What is the message they send to you? How would it feel to touch them? Which is the best spot in your neighbourhood to let sun caress your face? And are there streets and lanes in your neighbourhood where the wind seems to always blow?

Do you hear the wind whistling through the windows and rustling the leaves of the trees on your street? Or the sound of the motorway from afar like crashing waves? Can you hear birdsong, flapping seagull wings, the river roaring or raindrops on your roof? Are there cold surfaces in your neighbourhood from where the sound reverberates off? Do you hear children playing outside and people chatting front of the shops? Do you live on a busy street with lots of traffic? Can you hear the signal of the ice cream truck on sunny days, reminding you of childhood summer holidays? Is there music in your neighbourhood? If you were the composer of this cacophony what are the sounds that you would amplify in the melody of your neighbourhood? What are the smells that best describe your neighbourhood? And those that remind you of your home even with eyes closed? What is the first smell that hits you as you step out to the street? Is it the smoke of the traffic, the fresh earth after rain, or does the wind carry a waft of curry from the kitchen of that shop around the corner? And what are the smells that escape other people’s kitchens in your neighbourhood and make you want to invite yourself in for dinner? Are there edible plants and fruits growing in your street? How do the lanes and backgardens smell in your neighbourhood?
Are there abandoned pieces of land, a little corner, an empty car park perhaps, that you would inhabit with sounds, shapes, colours and smells? Are there cracks and edges on your street where all weeds can freely grow? Is there space in your neighbourhood for your imagination to flow?

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MYLANDSCOT LAND ENGAGEMENT  Research by the Scottish Land Commission and land engagement designed by Ice Cream Architecture  Mapping and exploring land issues and #landreform with young people.  (Click below to Keep reading)

Right before the lockdown happened in March 2020, I was lucky to be part of  facilitating this land engagement workshop in Dalry (Galloway National Park, Scotland) with high school students.  It was inspiring to see the way Ice Cream Architecture designed, facilitated and analysed land engagement with young people.

It inspired me in the development of my own Sensory Land Engagement method and framework for my MDes dipmola project at The Glasgow School of Art / Design Innovation School. 

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‘UNHEARD AND UNSEEN' - Sound mapping project, Barcelona A sound mapping project to embed the stories and voices of underrepresented groups of people in the soundscape of Barcelona - was chosen to be part of the IDENSITAT 'Sounds of our Cities', Creative Europe project. 

The mapping will be carried out in collaboration with Dear Hunter, and the sound installation piece will be recorded in 2020 October in Sant Andreu - a district in the northern part of Barcelona. Hear more about the project from this interview with IDENSITAT.  (Click on the Photo to Keep reading)

Urban spaces are primarily designed by and for men and the public realm outside the home is given significance in a way that domestic sounds are not. These genres of sound are lacking in the soundmap’s vast catalogue (both physically and sonically). During the covid pandemic, we are experiencing the dominance of domestic spaces - which have never before in our lifetimes were given such significance. But disabled and chronically ill voices have been overlooked – even though for these groups, being homebound may be commonplace. 

‘Unheard and Unseen' aims to explore ways in which acoustic notions such as ‘having a voice’ and ‘being heard’ can go beyond the metaphorical, with the ability to go beyond dividing lines of gender, domestic and public, private and collective, so that the personal can become political.

My project looks at researching and recording domestic, unheard sounds, stories and voices of the urban context and presenting these on a map - as the unseen layers of our urban spaces. Storytelling from often underrepresented groups (e.g women) in urban planning will be added to the soundscape of the city through a guided sound-walk. By making the unheard heard, bringing the inside (domestic, memory, emotional) outside, it also emphasises the duality of the sonic experience.

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‘SCHOOL FOR CIVIC IMAGINATION’ - PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT AND MAPPING, Glasgow I have been working in Glasgow since September 2019, as part of the ‘School for Civic Imagination’ at CCA: Glasgow through a Creative Europe I-Portunus artist mobility grant. 

The ‘School for Civic Imagination’ is part of CCA’s public engagement program, a year-long informal learning platform for artists and curators with a socially engaged practice. It discusses the meeting point between art and society and supports knowledge sharing between everyone taking part.  (Click below to Keep reading)

The School aims to represent a support structure for the development of deeper connections between socially engaged art practice and civic life, delivered by the collaborating artists - Allison Whitehill, Annie Runkel, CJ Mahony, Iman Tajik Tehran, Iryna Zamuruieva, Paria Goodarzi, Lily Garget, Lydia Honeybone, Casi Dylan, Chiara Dellerba, Jess Ramm, Zsofia Szonja Illés. Contributing artists shape the ‘School’ by curating its program and act as intermediaries between the knowledge and experience gained through the School and their networks.  

Monthly sessions, workshops and talks and invited contributors in 2019-20 include:  A movement workshop and reading group with G.O.D.S (Ashanti Harris ) - In praise of the dancing body (by Silvia Federici)

Sensory mapping workshop with Rob Morrison (Agile City) and Michael Smythe (Phytology) and a public lecture at CCA by Michael Smythe on ‘Biomorphic urbanism’.

A silent walk with M.U.C.K (Must Use Critical Knowledge) and The Nature Library to explore notions of drifting and being lost in the landscape - inspired by the writings of the wonderful Rebecca Solnit (on walking and being lost) and Donna Haraway (on situated knowledges). (Photo: The Nature Library)

A reading group with Yovonne Billimore (Programme Curator for Frame Contemporary Art Finland) to explore feminist approaches that emphasize the inclusion of multiple voices and perspectives (including the more-than-human) - Composting Feminisms and Environmental Humanities (by Jennifer Mae Hamilton and Astrida Neimanis).

A pasta-making performance/workshop with fellow artist Chiara Dellerba to practice self- and community care through embodied ways of engagement. 

Social distancing measures taken during the pandemic are challenging for anyone working with communities, engagement, and participation. Few of us from the ‘School’ continued engaging and experimenting with blended (online + embodied) ways of engagement through skill-share workshops and reading groups, in order to find ways for meaningful engagement in those spaces that are still available for us to share. Link to project

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DEMOLAB - UTOPIA FOR EDUCATION  A Co-design project with high school students

Demolab was a 3-year long non-formal artistic-civic educational project funded by UNDEF and ran by DIA in Budapest. It ended in September 2019, and it engaged with and encouraged high-school students to develop social sensitivity and learn democratic self-organisation through methods of critical design thinking. It was run by teachers, activists and artists who believe in the need for a democratised and innovated education. 

(Click below to Keep reading)

I was honoured to work with the students and an incredible art teacher from the Batthyány Kázmér High School in Szigetszentmiklos with my artist co-facilitator,  Dorottya Vékony.

The outcome of our project (during the 2018/19 school year) was a collaborative board-game that addressed issues young people cared about, such as climate change, technology, loneliness and isolation. (The text on the print designed by students says: ’Talk to me’)  These issues were presented through the flora, fauna, geography and population of the imaginary island San-Miguel (resembling the name of their school which means ’Saint Nicholas Island’). The risograph prints are pages of the Zine the students designed, and they give information about the island (eg: imaginary herbs growing on the island, favourite recipes). The map acts as the board to play the game on. 

The project was given a risograph to work with, and the students felt so empowered by the process that they ended up founding their independent student press (Jelen Kiadó) and publishing their own independent newspaper even throughout the lockdown. 

Their Publications and the Board Game can be downloaded from here.

The 3-year long project ended with the publication of the Demolab-methodology, a documentary and an exhibition (Utopia Áruház  = Utopia Shopping Mall) in one of the abandoned communist-era shopping malls in Budapest.

The Demolab Documentary can be found here.

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CARNIVAL TABLE Performative installation made with Lemonot (UK) and Space Saloon (USA) for Hello Wood 2019 Click below to read about the project

‘Carnival Table’ was born as a temporary inversion of social conventions. We want to use the ritual of eating and the symbolic power of a dining table - a place where people meet at the same level - in order to discard conventions and encourage a different practice of design, rooted in conviviality and freedom. By uncovering symbolic and social constructions through food, we aim to prompt a debate rich of symbolic explanations about human behavior and rituals.

The table is an ancient place of unity, cohesion, equal exchange. Around the table the man enjoyed, rejoiced, but above all he told - from Plato’s Symposium to Dante’s Convivio - the stories that have been handed down before a meal, and those that have invented and narrated the world.

We believe that it’s time for architecture to establish a new intimacy with its users, to become more human, to create culture and foster social interaction. With our Carnival table, we want architecture to provide space for self-expression instead of uniformity. We want architecture to draw people together instead of isolating them. We want architecture to be able to create stories again. Link to project

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CARNIVAL TABLE Performative installation made with Lemonot (UK) and Space Saloon (USA) for Hello Wood 2019 ‘Carnival Table’ was born as a temporary inversion of social conventions. We want to use the ritual of eating and the symbolic power of a dining table - a place where people meet at the same level - in order to discard conventions and encourage a different practice of design, rooted in conviviality and freedom. By uncovering symbolic and social constructions through food, we aim to prompt a debate rich of symbolic explanations about human behavior and rituals.  (Click below to Keep reading)

The table is an ancient place of unity, cohesion, equal exchange. Around the table the man enjoyed, rejoiced, but above all he told - from Plato’s Symposium to Dante’s Convivio - the stories that have been handed down before a meal, and those that have invented and narrated the world. 

We believe that it’s time for architecture to establish a new intimacy with its users, to become more human, to create culture and foster social interaction. With our Carnival table, we want architecture to provide space for self-expression instead of uniformity. We want architecture to draw people together instead of isolating them. We want architecture to be able to create stories again.  Link to project 

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ARCHIKIDS Budapest  A Festival for Co-Designing Urban Spaces with Children

Urban planning has historically given insufficient consideration to vulnerable groups, including children. In the field of urban planning and design, engagement with the community is acknowledged as being desirable, but in reality, their contribution remains largely undervalued and undiscovered. 

As the curator of ‘ARCHIKIDS Budapest’ Festival (in 2019 at KÉK - Contemporary Architecture Center) I was aiming to start a discussion with the public and professionals working in the field of urban planning and architecture, to prove that children can be powerful agents in the design and implementation of better urban environments.  (Click below to Keep reading)

The design of the Festival program has been informed by the central question and key drive in how we could engaging children and families early in the process for the co-creation of better urban environments. Programs - such as sensory mapping with children and young people - were designed to involve and empower them in urban planning, and show the benefits of their involvement to professionals also involved in the process. (The first Photo is an Illustration from the documentary If…) Link to project

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The Kisdiófa Community Gardens (Budapest) is one of the vacant land / community  garden projects run by KÉK - Contemporary Architecture Center, who were the pioneers of urban gardening in Hungary. 

(Click below to Keep reading)

Until May 2019  I was working as the engagement programmer of the Budapest Community Gardens and assisting in the development of the first therapeutic garden in Budapest. To support the development of the Garden and engage the public in the process a 'Therapeutic Gardens and Nature Theraphy' public lecture series was curated by me (see the first 3 photographs by Máté Bartha). It aimed at starting a discussion amongst the public and professionals to highlight the therapeutic benefits of nature in the urban context  The last 3 photos photos were taken at the last community engagement event I have organised for the Gardens last Spring, before I would have moved to work on my MDes in Glasgow. (Photos: Anna Vera Lengyel, Musician: Gergely Demény)

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BEES/WAX  Sensory Installation - made with Architecture Uncomfortable Workshop for MENÜ imaginaire x Design Week Budapest (2018)

MENÜ imaginaire looks into the prospects of our food and eating habits. Futurist rituals, utopian-dystopian fingerfoods whipped up by contemporary artists and designers. We are in 2018. Resources are already limited.  (Click below to Keep reading)

BEES/WAX: Honey mead fermented in wax-glazed ceramic jar, served in beeswax cups - as an alternative of plastic. 

BEES/WAX looks into experimenting with an organic biodegredable material which has diverse possible ways of utilisation, and unlike plastic doesn’t release toxic particles but scents, flavours and antiseptics. Investigating the ways smell can activate existing memories and associations in the brain, the sensory experience while using these wax utensils also offers a connection to a missing link with nature. This connection is elemental to our human experience, and is hugely missing from an age when closely 70% of the world’s population is living in urban environments. According to the vision of the artists, connection - memories and sensory experiences - to our food and everyday objects should be the primary utopian element of our future food and design.

Video: Gergely Ofner

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BEES/WAX Sensory Installation and food event with Architecture Uncomfortable Workshop for Design Week Budapest 2018   Honey mead fermented in wax-glazed ceramic, beeswax cups The MENÜ Imaginaire group exhibition and performance lecture look into the utopian prospects of our food and eating habits. Our Bees/Wax project proposes speculative design objects (and ‘speculative food’) that build on evoking sensory experiences, memory and connection as primary elements of the future of relating to our food and environment.  

(Click below to Keep reading)

BEES/WAX experiments with an organic biodegradable material that has diverse possible ways of utilization, and - unlike plastic - that doesn’t release toxic particles but scents, flavours and antiseptics. While investigating ways in which smell can activate existing memories and associations in the brain, the sensory experience evoked by the use of the wax utensils also aims at offering a connection to a missing link with nature. 

video: Daniel Halasz

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A COMMON GROUND - TATE Britain Public Installation and Engagement with Something & Son, 2018 TATE Britain ‘A Common Ground’ installation and garden is addressing the modern epidemic of loneliness in our urban environments. The plants, vegetables, herbs and flowers in the garden have been chosen to reflect multicultural London today, and highlight the unexpected ancient origin of plants and how they’re used in modern-day cuisines. Visitors can learn more about the plants in the garden through workshops and are invited to visit the greenhouse to share their food story, memory or favourite recipe in the food scrapbook. (Click below to Keep reading)

Using sensors, voice recognition, and sculptures, the garden is designed to instigate sociability – talking will trigger fountains to flow and metaphorically sustain the life of the garden, and structures will gently shepherd people together. The aim is to make visitors feel at ease and to encourage conversation, eye contact, and connections with strangers.  Design by artist collective Something & Son. Herbal garden design, Engagement programming, and workshop facilitation: Collective Plant / Zsófia Szonja Illés

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A COMMON GROUND - TATE Britain Public Installation and Engagement with Something & Son, TATE Britain, 2018 Using sensors, voice recognition and sculptures, the garden is designed to instigate sociability – talking will trigger fountains to flow and metaphorically sustain the life of the garden and structures will gently shepherd people together. The aim is to make visitors feel at ease and to encourage conversation, eye contact and connections with strangers. The garden is addressing the modern epidemic of loneliness.  (Click below to Keep reading)

The plants, vegetables, herbs and flowers in the garden have been chosen to reflect multicultural London today, and highlight the unexpected ancient origin of plants and how they’re used in modern-day cuisines. Visitors can learn more about the plants in the garden through workshops and are invited to visit the greenhouse to share their food story, memory or favorite recipe in the food scrapbook. Design by artist collective Something & Son. Herbal garden design, Engagement programming and Workshop facilitation: Collective Plant / Zsófia Szonja Illés

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WINTER CAMP / A proposal for Warming Huts concept and design with Space Saloon (2018)

Inspired by the local traditions of the Inuit and Métis tribes of the Red River region, Winter Camp is a gathering space for people to meet, mix, exchange culture and—in the process—produce heat.  (Click below to Keep reading)

The interior volume of the pavilion, a large and lightweight insulated “space blanket,” expands and contracts in tandem with the various activities taking place around the collective bench. While river trekkers pass in and out of the space, sipping local Labrador teas, breathing in traditional Métis pine and spruce steam vapour clouds, or simply enjoying a taste of fermented food cooked over the central campfire, the heat-reflective mylar canopy slowly inflates with warm air. With the low temperature of the surrounding environment, a minimal amount of heat inside generates the necessary pressure differential to grow this collective lung, bouncing a shimmering golden light onto the white canvas of snow below.

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HELLO PIZZA installation, HELLO WOOD Project Village 2017 In collaboration with Danny Wills and Gianmaria Socci (Space Saloon)

Throughout history the oven was a cornerstone of village life - the place where families gathered, news was shared, politics debated, and community was built. Hello Pizza is a project that wants to re-discover this important typology while transforming it with new shared functions. The project aims to create community through the process of cooking. (Click below to Keep reading)

Found at the center of our courtyard is the oven, surrounded by a modular table where all of the processes of making pizza become shared moments – growing herbs and ingredients, preparation of the dough, baking, eating, and cleaning, including compost and other sustainable circular systems. Through the layered assembly of both construction elements and acquired ingredients, grows the pizza kitchen in complexity and variety – expressing the multiple backgrounds and tastes of those coming together to eat, drink, and celebrate. Video 

Read more about the project in here + Domus / Designboom / Archdaily