Encounters

Dear Friend, I have started a crowdfunding campaign to raise money for Encounters, a new project I am developing as an extension of my artistic practice. I am writing in hopes that you will support me in this venture.

Encounters will be an evolving collection of audio pieces designed to mediate experiences with artworks, landscapes and public monuments. They will be made accessible through a custom-designed smartphone App. Each encounter will be a kind of alternative audioguide to diverse and unusual places and objects, combining narration and song. Many encounters be connected to specific artworks and fixed places in the world but others will be designed for more universal spaces, like a room at night, an open field, a subway ride. In fact, my hope is that even site-specific pieces can be experienced off-site, allowing the listener to encounter a monument in Berlin while going for a stroll in Montréal, for example.

Encounters evolves directly out of more than fifteen years devoted to creating artworks in which singing, speaking, narrating and calling are central gestures. In the video below I present a short history of my artistic practice, which will give you a sense of the themes and aesthetics that drive my artistic practice and will inform Encounters.

I will develop the content and material for Encounters in dialogue and collaboration with friends and colleagues in various cities, forging collaborations that privilege the co-creation of meaningful, complex encounters with the authors, artists, musicians, choreographers and thinkers who are part of my community.

The money I am trying to raise will allow me to pay for the design and programming of the App (around €4,000), the recording and mastering of the first suite of Encounters (around €2,000) and the launch and promotion of the finished product (around €1,000). I have created a series of rewards based on my existing art practice: handwritten love letters, editioned prints and personalized, custom-made audio encounters.

If you have any questions about my concept, my plans, or the details about the rewards listed on this page, I would be delighted to tell you more. Feel free to contact me anytime at [email protected]. Je peux vous répondre aussi en français. Ich antworte gern auch auf Deutsch. You can also visit my website for more information about me, and to hear some recently created audio encounters for a museum in Stockholm visit this page. I tell can tell you more about my vision and motivation for Encounters in the video below.

My heartfelt thanks for your support as I embark on this new artistic adventure!

Sincerely, Benny